Because You Were Gone
by bingblot
Summary: He hadn't seen her in weeks but he suddenly wondered, no matter what happened with Bond, if he was really ready to walk away from Nikki Heat, walk away from her. AU for 2x5 "When the Bough Breaks."
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: All things "Castle" belong to ABC and Andrew Marlowe & co.

Author's Note: An AU for 2x5 "When the Bough Breaks," in which Alexis and Castle didn't have the conversation about boys not apologizing so Castle never returned to the precinct to apologize to Beckett at the end of 2x1 "Deep in Death," so that was his last case.

 **Because You Were Gone**

 _Chapter 1_

What was the matter with him?

Castle surveyed himself in the mirror with a rather jaundiced eye. He was freshly shaved, his hair styled just so, and wearing one of his nicer suits. He looked ruggedly handsome, if he did say so himself, like the suave, successful millionaire that he was.

Or at least, he would have looked like the suave, successful millionaire that he was if it weren't for the fact that his expression could best be described as glum.

He pasted on his best insouciant smirk, trying it on. He was Richard Castle, damn it, living the dream and all that, and he still had game. Really.

The smirk wavered and then fell off entirely as he grimaced. He really needed to get better about lying to himself. Or not lying since lying was such a harsh word, acting. Yes, he needed to get better at acting like he wasn't, erm, feeling down.

He couldn't seem to shake off the nagging feeling of discontent, of ennui even. And not even the prospect of writing James Bond had prodded him out of it.

It was ridiculous. He was basically on top of the world, living the sort of life most men could only dream of, the sort of life he had dreamed of certainly.

And still he wasn't happy.

Oh, who was he kidding, he was moping.

Damn it. There was no reason for him to mope. Absolutely none.

He'd been giving himself this sort of pep talk in varying iterations for maybe six weeks now (he tried to tell himself he had no idea what had brought this mood on) in the hope that repetition might brainwash him into believing it. But right on cue, just as had happened every time, he heard _her_ voice in his head, the one that had taken to practically haunting him these past weeks (and really, even he hadn't believed it was possible before to be haunted by someone who not only was neither dead nor imaginary but was very much alive—and possibly hated him.) _You dredged up my past for you, Castle, not for me, and you're too selfish to even see it. The case is closed, Castle. We had a deal and I expect you to honor it._

He sighed.

He'd honored it. It had quite possibly been one of the hardest things he'd ever had to do, to walk away from her knowing it was for the last time but he'd done it. And in the weeks since (okay, fine, 7 weeks and 2 days but who was counting?), he'd still honored it. He'd resisted every urge to contact Bob Weldon and just _happen_ to mention how useful and informative his time working with the NYPD had been and he would hate for Nikki Heat to be a one-hit wonder heroine and…

More directly, he'd resisted every urge (which meant about a hundred times every day) to contact Beckett directly. Resisted the urge to explain himself (again), or wheedle or cajole, or ply her with his charm and wit (not that she'd ever shown any propensity to be charmed by him but he ignored that). His only contact with Beckett since walking out of the precinct had been to send her an advance copy of the book (to which she'd sent him a terse text saying only _Thanks for the book_ and he'd responded with equal brevity _You're welcome_ , not daring to send more and not knowing what he'd say anyway) and then he'd sent her a personal invitation to the book launch party tonight (to which she hadn't responded at all).

She really might hate him now. He sighed again. (He'd probably sighed more in the last month than he had in the last decade.)

And what might have made it worse was that he couldn't tell himself anymore that it wasn't his own fault. _Too selfish to even see it._

He had tried in the weeks since then to justify himself, engaged in more mental arguments with her voice that had taken up residence in his head than he cared to admit to, reasons, justifications. Excuses.

But with every day that passed, his reasons seemed to get lamer.

He could tell himself—and he had—that he'd only had the best intentions, that all he'd wanted was to help her, use the connections he had to try to help her, give Beckett some of the peace she gave to others every day. It was even true.

It just wasn't the entire truth.

Because the real truth was that at first, when he'd asked (and semi-bribed through a promise of permission to borrow his Ferrari) Esposito into showing him Johanna Beckett's case file, he hadn't had any real plan in mind. It had started as curiosity, that ever-nagging wish to know more about everything and about Beckett in particular. Seeing the sheen of tears in Beckett's eyes, having her share the story of the life she lost and the life she saved (as brief as it was), had turned his usual curiosity into a need to know more, know the rest of the story.

It had been curiosity.

And even when he'd decided to call up Clark Murray to have him look into the file, it had still been curiosity, mixed in with a healthy dose of… ego… That was what it was, low be it spoken. He'd wanted to prove to Beckett that he could be useful, that just because he wasn't a cop didn't mean he couldn't help her solve cases and he'd figured what better way to show that and get her gratitude— _face it, Rick, you were showing off and wanted to impress her_ —than by solving her mother's case.

He had a long, ignominious track record of doing stupid things in order to show off and impress a pretty woman—but he had the gnawing feeling that this was the absolute worst thing. (And if anything was going to cure him of impulsively doing things to impress a woman, this might have done it.)

Yes, he'd wanted to help her—but again, as she'd said, he'd then gone about helping in the way he wanted to help without a thought for Beckett herself and what she wanted. Pried into the most personal, painful part of her past without so much as a by-your-leave.

"Helping" someone who didn't want to be helped was little better than forcing them to do what you wanted.

It was an ugly thought. An ugly truth.

But in these last weeks, he'd had to face up to it. The weeks since Beckett had sent him away had given him a little too much time to think about his own actions where Beckett was concerned, too much time to take a good look at himself in the stark light of Beckett's words.

It wasn't that getting into trouble was new to him but he'd been largely insulated from the consequences of his own impulsivity and mistakes, able to buy (not to say bribe, unofficially) or persuade or generally charm his way out of trouble. That was the reality of the world he'd lived in. It had spoiled him, made him more thoughtless than he was already inclined to be.

But then he'd met Beckett. Beckett, who could not have been more removed from the world of careless money and celebrity starlets. Beckett, who was real—and in the months of working with her, he'd started to want to be real too, want to be more than the façade of the devil-may-care playboy author that he'd lived for so long.

He had, he realized, gotten out of practice at dealing with people (women) who didn't want anything from him, whether it was his money, his fame, his connections, or his body. Beckett didn't care about—not to say, actively disliked—his money, his fame, and his connections, and she was too strong-minded to fall for his looks or his charm. He liked and respected her all the more for it—but ironically, it was this very strength of character that was making things harder for him now because it stripped him of his usual methods of getting out of trouble. Beckett had shown him—what was the line from Austen?—how insufficient all his pretensions were to please a woman worthy of being pleased.

And so, he'd finally made a mistake he couldn't throw money at to fix or wheedle or charm his way out of. And he'd woken up to an emotion he generally didn't allow himself to feel: shame. And remorse. And loss, as if he'd lost something he hadn't even realized was so precious to him until it was gone.

Enough of this!

He might be a writer and writers were allowed, even expected, to brood, but this had gone past brooding and tipped well into wallowing territory.

And he flat out refused to do that.

He was Richard freaking Castle, living out all his boyhood dreams, really. He had an amazing daughter (as always, he felt a flicker of warmth in his chest at the thought of Alexis), a loving (if melodramatic and overwhelming) mother, a successful career (about to be capped off, knock on wood, by an official offer to write the major re-launch of the most well-known British secret agent and one of the coolest fictional characters ever), a great loft, more money than he could spend in a lifetime, and if he wanted, he could have almost any one of the city's most beautiful women on his arm and possibly warming his bed.

It was her loss if one particular beautiful woman in the NYPD didn't want anything to do with him. Really.

He wasn't going to pine for her. He wasn't.

Never mind that she was brilliant and funny and kind and challenging in the best way. And compassionate and driven and tenacious and so strong it was awe-inspiring. Oh, and well-read and insightful and a crack shot. To say nothing of being gorgeous and sexy and the hottest woman he'd set eyes on in quite some time.

But that was it.

Oh, shit.

No no no no. He absolutely, flatly refused to fall in love with Kate Beckett.

He wouldn't. He wasn't.

Anyway, she probably hated him.

And he might never see her again since he had no idea if she'd show up to tonight's launch party. Possibly—probably?—not since it wasn't as if she'd disguised her distinct lack of pleasure at the fame that came with being known as the inspiration for Nikki Heat.

He couldn't love her. He refused to be in love with her.

( _Too late, Rick. After all, the heart wants what the heart wants.)_

Shut up. No no no. He was absolutely not in love with Beckett. Not at all.

Besides, she was stubborn and emotionally reticent and frustrating and slow to trust and she drove him crazy a lot of the time. (He tried very hard to convince himself that those were deal-breaker character flaws on par with hating Alexis and torturing puppies and kittens.)

He just… missed her. Or not her so much as missed working in the precinct, that feeling of accomplishment, of contributing to a worthy cause, the camaraderie of the other cops. Yeah, that was what he missed. And her. A little.

A lot. ( _Shut up._ )

Castle pushed any and all musings related to stubborn, infuriating NYPD detectives out of his head by force of will and focused on his own image in the mirror again, glancing back and forth between it and his open closet.

"Tie or no tie," he muttered, one hand reaching in to grasp one, no, two, ties and pulling them off the rack to hold them up against himself. "Tie or no tie."

"I vote for no tie."

Alexis's voice had him twisting to look at his daughter as she stood in the doorway of his bedroom. She was already dressed up for the launch party, looking scarily grown up in a dark maroon dress that ended inches above her knee (modest enough not to give him a coronary but still way too high for his preference—had she cut a couple inches off the hem? Not that she would but really, when had teenage girl's dresses started to be so damn short?) Not wanting to be killed, he opted not to question this, only smiled, "You look beautiful, Alexis."

She dimpled at him. "Thanks, Dad. I wanted to see if you were ready and let you know that Grams should be ready on time for once. I stopped her when she was dithering over which dress to wear."

"You have my eternal gratitude, daughter."

She smirked at him. "Yeah, I'll remind you of that next time I want to go out on a date."

He pretended to scowl at her. "I can still put you in a convent, you know."

"No, you can't."

Damn it, she was right. This threatening thing had been so much easier when she was little and didn't know so much about the world. Also, he'd been able to wheedle and bribe through things like more dessert or more books or a later bedtime, which didn't work so well now that she was in high school.

He made a face at her and turned back to the mirror and the question at hand. "So, no tie, you think?"

She came to stand beside him. "Nah, you look all stuffy when you wear a tie and you know you don't really like wearing ties, Dad."

"Fair point. Very well, I defer to your expertise, oh child of mine," he quipped and put the ties back.

She didn't laugh, only studied him soberly. "Dad, will she be at the party?"

"Will who be at the party?" he parried, playing dumb. He didn't need to make it so obvious that he knew immediately who Alexis was asking about, as if Beckett were the only other "she" in existence. It might be the truth as far as he was con—no, no, it was not. He wasn't thinking like that.

Predictably, Alexis saw right through him, giving him one of her silly-Dad looks. "Beckett, Dad. Will Detective Beckett be at the party?"

He bit back a sigh. "I, uh, don't know, pumpkin. I sent her an invitation." He'd also sent a personal invitation to Captain Montgomery, Esposito, Ryan, and Lanie, and a more general invitation to everyone at the 12th. He expected the Captain and the boys would be there and it would be nice to see them, at least.

Alexis gave him a reassuring smile. "She'll probably come. I mean, she's the inspiration for Nikki Heat. It wouldn't look right if she isn't at the launch party."

He put on a smile for her benefit. "Of course you're right." Admittedly, Beckett wasn't much for artificiality and she didn't like publicity. But he was an optimist. Beckett was polite and it'd be rude to turn down a personal invitation to a book launch party about a character inspired by her. Right?

"And Dad?"

"Hmm?"

"When you see Beckett again, maybe you could try just apologizing?"

"I don't think it's going to be quite that simple, sweetie," he said gently.

She gave him a narrow-eyed look. "Don't patronize me, Dad. I'm not 5 anymore. I'm just saying, I know you and you don't like to admit you did anything wrong, you try to crack a joke or justify it and then move on."

He opened his mouth and then closed it, feeling a little uncomfortable heat creeping up his neck. She wasn't wrong. But it was lowering to be scolded so soundly by your own daughter.

"But you always used to tell me that it was good to apologize when you've hurt someone's feelings even if you didn't mean to. And you were right about that. It shows you care more about that person's feelings than you do about your own pride."

He stilled, struck by the wisdom of the words. Why was it so much easier to be clear-eyed when it came to giving advice and not when it was time to act on it?

After a moment, he slid his arm around his daughter's shoulders, hugging her to him as he pressed a kiss to her hair. "Thank you, sweetie. How did you get to be so smart?"

"I think it's a hereditary anomaly since I know I didn't get it from you," she deadpanned.

He made a face at her in the mirror. "Hey!" he pretended to grumble. "That's not fair since you said it was advice I used to give you."

Alexis smirked. "You're sort of like Alice. You give very good advice but you very seldom follow it."

He had to laugh. "Point taken, oh cheeky one. I'll apologize to Beckett at the party if she's there," he promised. And even if she wasn't at the party, he would find a way to apologize to her, for real, the way he probably should have done earlier.

"Good." Alexis rested her head against his shoulder for a moment, rather as she had used to when she was little. "I don't like it when you mope around the way you have been."

Great, even Alexis thought he'd been moping. "I'll do better, I promise, pumpkin." He released Alexis and gave her a gentle nudge. "Now go run up and see if Grams is about ready."

"Right. After all, we can't keep your adoring fans waiting," Alexis quipped as she left.

"Exactly. I must go to where adoration awaits me," he proclaimed dramatically just to make her laugh (and succeeding).

Launch party first. Apologize to Beckett second (or during). And having a concrete plan of action made him feel marginally better.

Besides, he enjoyed his book launch parties.

Or at least, he had, he found himself thinking a little more than an hour later. Not so much anymore.

He smiled, thanked people, posed for pictures, signed books (but nothing else—a last-minute decision he couldn't explain), flirted, joked, and generally played the role of Richard Castle, charming playboy author. But all the while, he was conscious that it was a role he was playing and one that he didn't particularly enjoy anymore.

He was reminded of this last spring, of what he'd said to Alexis at the _Storm Fall_ launch party. He was tired of all this, bored with the parties, even the adulation, because it was so fake and so predictable. Oh, he could play the role just fine, it was practically second nature to him now. He could have responded to the gushes that he was their favorite author, that they'd read all his books, the questions of where he got his ideas and what he was working on next in his sleep. Which was the problem.

He wanted something real, something challenging.

He missed... the precinct. (He refused to think that he missed… someone more.) It was one place he'd found outside of his own home where he was valued for himself, for his own contributions, and not for his money or his fame or his connections.

At least Captain Montgomery was here, as were Esposito and Ryan. He'd exchanged smiles and waves with them but hadn't been able to escape the line of fans waiting for an autograph. Later, though. He knew from experience that the first rush of people would dwindle into a trickle soon enough, allowing him more time to actually socialize.

There was still no sign of her.

He suppressed a sigh and turned his smile to the next giggling fan.

It was a little while later that he heard a little increased buzz from outside. Maybe Bob Weldon had decided to stop by after all or—and he knew which one he was hoping for—the real "Nikki Heat" had arrived.

It was her.

She was here. She'd come after all.

He heard a flurry of whispers, saw a few pointing fingers, and forced himself not to turn his back on the fan whose clutches he was currently in until he'd given the fan the requisite minute or so of personal attention.

And then, finally, he was able to turn and see her.

Oh. Holy… Wow.

He froze and stared. She looked—well, she was always beautiful but tonight, in a skin-tight electric blue dress that left nothing to the imagination and made her legs look like they went on for miles… He practically felt every thought in his head that wasn't directly related to her drain out of his head and flop onto the ground at his feet.

She'd been talking to Montgomery but then she moved to the table stacked with copies of _Heat Wave_ , picking one up, and he suddenly realized she wouldn't have seen the dedication yet.

The thought somehow allowed him to yank his feet from where they'd taken root and head towards her, as if she exerted a magnetic pull. (She honestly might.)

But before he'd managed to take more than two steps, he was waylaid by a hand grasping his arm and had to stop before he plowed right into the woman and he blinked before he belatedly recognized Paula.

Oh damn. He couldn't ignore his own agent.

"Paula."

"Rick, finally, you're free. I've got great news. You got the official offer!"

That got him to blink and tear his gaze and (some of) his attention off Beckett. "Really?"

"I had to wheedle them a little but they gave in so it's a three-book deal and I got them to throw in an option for another if the first two sell…"

Beckett read the dedication. He saw her expression change in a way he couldn't describe and Paula's voice faded away—to be fair, everything faded away from his consciousness except for Beckett.

"Yeah, yeah, that's great," he responded absently, not aware if Paula had actually paused or not but he needed to say something.

"Rick!" Paula snapped her fingers in front of his nose, making him blink and jerk his head back a little. "You're not even listening to me."

"Sorry," he managed perfunctorily. "Three book deal with an option for a fourth, I heard."

She gave an exasperated huff. "Never mind the other details. You aren't paying attention now anyway. Just go over there, do whatever you have to do to get her out of your system—"

"I don't think that's ever going to happen," he interrupted automatically, unthinkingly. "I'll—uh—get back to you on the offer, okay? Thanks. Bye."

He didn't wait for a response before he'd edged away from her, twisting his arm free of her grasp, and was heading towards Beckett again.

It occurred to him for the first time to wonder if Bond really was such a name to be reckoned with after all, if Bond really was the character he wanted to be writing about. Could any character possibly fascinate him as much as Nikki Heat?

Oh, who was he kidding, it wasn't Nikki Heat that fascinated him. It wasn't Nikki Heat he couldn't imagine walking away from.

He was never going to be ready to walk away from Beckett.

Because he loved her.

Oh, shit.

 _~To be continued…~_


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Author's Note: And now for Beckett's thoughts…

 **Because You Were Gone**

 _Chapter 2_

What was she doing?

Kate surveyed herself in the mirror with some satisfaction mixed in with irritation that she even felt satisfaction.

Because she shouldn't. She absolutely should not want to impress… anyone. Let alone a certain writer. A certain, supremely annoying writer.

And yet… she couldn't deny that a tiny part of her did want to impress him. Make him choke on his own tongue when he saw her. A little.

Damn it.

She shouldn't care what he thought. She didn't care what he thought.

It was just a party and from what she remembered of his book launch party that she'd crashed earlier this spring, his book launch parties were glitzy, glamorous affairs. And there'd be press and she didn't doubt that she'd get a fair amount of attention as—she tried not to roll her eyes—the real Nikki Heat.

Yeah, that was why she'd dressed up. It had nothing to do with him or his reaction to seeing her in this dress. Really.

Besides, after tonight, she'd probably never see him again.

She caught the way her expression seemed to darken at the thought and scowled at herself in the mirror.

She didn't want to admit it but she had kind of gotten used to having him around so she… noticed when he was gone. Yeah, she just noticed. Not that she… missed him or anything. Not at all.

It was just quieter. Different. By which she meant, back to normal. Without the empty space beside her chattering to her or, well, not the empty space chattering because that would be creepy but someone in the empty space beside her chattering at her. (When had her thoughts started to babble like him?) Without a writer buzzing around with far-fetched theories and bad jokes and irritating innuendos. (And his voice that had, annoyingly, taken up residence in her head commented on her accidental alliteration. And there she went again. Argh.)

It was, she told herself for at least the thousandth time in the last six weeks or so, better without him around to distract her and throw her and the boys out of their usual sync in working as a team. They'd done just fine as the team with the highest case closure rate in the precinct before he'd come along and they would continue to do just fine without him.

So she'd go to this launch party because it would be rude not to show up when she was the so-called inspiration for the book, she'd smile and make nice for a couple hours, and then she'd go back to the real world and never see Richard Castle again.

And she'd be just fine with that. Really.

She made herself keep her eyes turned away from her bookshelf, from the shelf that had all his books on it. For all the good it did since she could swear his name (and, possibly, the memory of his eyes and his smile and—no, just his name and that was bad enough) had been tattooed onto her brain so she couldn't get him out of her thoughts.

Damn him anyway! How dare he just barge into her neatly-organized, settled life and insinuate himself into it until she found herself orienting to the empty space beside her, waiting for the quip or the theory that never came? How dare he make her start to find him a little amusing and not terrible to have around with his jokes and his humor alleviating the stress of the days until she found she had to drive with the radio on just to have some noise because the level of silence when it was just her in her car was getting to her, even though it never had before? How dare he buy an espresso machine for the entire floor that she couldn't help but see, reminding her of him and everything she was trying to forget, every time she went into the break room? And how dare he start bringing her coffees just the way she liked them every morning until she got used to them and having to go back to the old coffee machine was even harder, since she'd refused to use his machine for the first weeks as the thought of using his machine made her feel a little sick? (And even that didn't help since all it did was bring to mind his descriptor and how dare he come up with such a stupid, ridiculous, memorable turn of phrase so "monkey peed in battery acid" just refused to leave her thoughts every time she drank the sludge?)

Damn annoying man.

She hated him.

She really wished she hated him.

But even her anger wasn't around to sustain her any longer. Not really. She still hated what he'd done, digging into her past like that, still felt the swift stab of emotion at the thought of it, but the sustaining fire of it was gone, reduced to a few smoldering embers.

Because he hadn't meant to hurt her. He hadn't known what her mom's case did to her. Castle was a lot of things—the words, rash and impulsive, among others, came to mind—but he wasn't cruel.

Not that it mattered. Much. (She had decided to start using his coffee machine though because resisting was only cutting off her nose to spite her face and, she reasoned, coffee was a necessity for her to work and it wasn't as if the coffee machine had been for her, personally, but for the entire floor.)

Anyway, he had hurt her, intentionally or no, and he was too arrogant to so much as admit he might have done something wrong.

So this shadowing thing, this quasi-partnership thing, the burgeoning friendship-or-something was over, done. She could just be a cop working with other cops, no more civilian consultant to worry about, especially one who seemed incapable of following directions.

Besides, he'd obviously finished the Nikki Heat book so he didn't need to do any more "research." And she was just fine with that. It wasn't like she'd ever wanted him around to begin with.

The cab jerked to a stop and she blinked to realize that they'd arrived, looking out to see—oh god, really? There was an actual red carpet rolled out until the street, literal spotlights around, and a scrum of reporters gathered at the entrance to the hotel. And she wondered, not for the first time, what she was thinking and how she'd gotten roped into this. This wasn't her life.

It was just a few hours. She could do this.

She stiffened her spine, opened the cab door, and stepped out, trying very hard to look as if strutting up a red carpet was something she did every day. At least she looked the part, she knew.

There were just a few isolated camera flashes at first but then she heard someone call out, "Hey, it's Nikki Heat," and then the rush was on. She forced a smile and nodded rather blindly around, blinking from all the flashbulbs going off around her. She was a NYPD homicide detective, damn it, she wasn't going to be intimidated by a bunch of reporters.

The distance from the sidewalk to the entrance seemed approximately a mile long but she finally made it inside. The interior was arranged to be just as glitzy but at least it didn't have the spotlights or as many cameras flashing in her face.

And she relaxed somewhat as one of the first faces she saw was a familiar one, Captain Montgomery.

He gave her a half-quizzical, half-approving smile. "You clean up nice, Detective."

She smiled. "Thank you, sir." She couldn't blame him for his surprise. He'd seen her just hours ago in her work clothes and now was seeing her again in a short, tight dress, looking like just about any other celebutante. It was hardly obvious that her little clutch carried her small back-up piece, along with her badge.

"I bet Castle will be glad to see you."

As if the mention of his name had made her gaze hone in on him (or more prosaically, there was a shift in the crowd as some people moved), she suddenly saw him. Castle.

He was mostly turned away from her as he talked to a woman whose dress, what little there was of it, looked as if it had been painted on (thinly, at that). She couldn't really see much of his face, just a narrow strip of it, but that was enough. After so many weeks of not seeing him, the sheer physical impact of his appearance walloped her in the chest like a punch to the sternum, leaving her suddenly unsure how to find her next breath.

He looked… good. Really, really good. In a suit that showcased his height and the breadth of his shoulders, his hair styled just so, the upward quirk of his lips as he smiled at the fan.

Oh god. Everything about him, everything she felt (and everything she didn't want to feel) just rose up inside her, clutching her by the throat until she thought she might choke. Lingering anger and hurt and regret and liking and _want_ —lust coursing like lava through her veins.

Shit. _No._ She didn't want to want him. She certainly didn't want to miss him. And she absolutely refused to like him.

She jerked her eyes away from him and back to Montgomery. Safer. "Well, he seems pretty happy where he is." Damn it, that sounded almost… jealous. She hadn't meant it like that, had just needed to say something.

Montgomery, thankfully, not being either Esposito or Ryan or Lanie, didn't comment or tease her about it, barely reacted except for an infinitesimal lift of his brows. "I wouldn't be so sure of that. After all, it's not every woman Castle compliments so highly."

Her breath stuttered in her chest. "Sir?" Castle had… complimented her? When? (And damn it, why did she even care when she'd told herself she was so over him, this?)

Now, Montgomery raised his brows more. "You mean, you didn't know about the dedication?"

"No, I—the dedication?" There hadn't been a dedication page in the advance copy of the book he'd sent her. Nor had there been a note or anything.

Montgomery gestured to a table with stacks of _Heat Wave_ on it. "Go see for yourself, Beckett."

"Yes, sir."

She stepped quickly over to the table of books, trying not to feel self-conscious about picking up a book that everyone present knew was purportedly inspired by her, and opened one to the dedication page.

Oh. Oh god. The words seemed to leap out at her, the black of the letters bold and stark against the white of the page. She felt her traitorous heart warm and soften inside her because—oh god—how could she possibly not soften towards a man who would write something like that, call her extraordinary, in front of the entire world? And not just what he'd written about her, but the camaraderie expressed in the rest of it, thanking the precinct too.

Because the words reminded her all over again of the things she'd been trying to forget, the things she'd tried to deny. That Castle, when he wasn't being an ass, was also… nice. He'd surprised her a little with the ease with which he accepted the ribbing and teasing that went along with being part of the cop brotherhood. And he might irritate her but he also made her laugh in a way she hadn't in years and she couldn't deny that he was clever and she'd felt that tug that came from meeting an intellect that could challenge her, prod her into seeing things a different way. He'd made her work more fun.

She really might have missed him. A little.

At that supremely inopportune (for her) moment, he appeared beside her, his so blue eyes bright, his expression a little… hesitant and hopeful and maybe shyly eager, if it wasn't ridiculous to think of the word, shy, in relation to Rick Castle. Her heart—damn treacherous organ that it was—fluttered yet again. ( _No, stop it!_ )

"Beckett. You… uh, you came."

He was absolutely not allowed to say her name like that, make it sound as if her presence was a blessing, and it should be against the law for him to look at her like that too, as if he never wanted to look at anything else ever again. She felt another flutter of _something_ in her chest, suppressed the sudden wish to step closer to him.

She felt heat prickle in her cheeks and forced a casual, dismissive smile. "The Captain insisted. It's good press for the NYPD so we're cooperating."

"Oh." Something flickered across his expression before he rallied. "Well, I'm glad. It's… uh… good to see you."

She opened her mouth to say, _you too_ , automatically—but then closed it. It might be true—she didn't want it to be true—but she sure as hell wasn't admitting it to him. She was still angry at him, she reminded herself. Really, she was.

There was a beat of silence that stretched on a moment too long, became awkward with her lack of response to what he'd said. She suddenly felt a flicker of guilt, as if she'd been rude, which was so not fair because he was the one that had hurt her and she had nothing to feel guilty about.

It was still her turn to talk, say something. "I… thanks for the book and… uh, the dedication," she blurted out.

"You're welcome. I… hoped you'd like it." He didn't specify whether he was referring to the book or the dedication but she supposed it hardly mattered. He really needed to stop looking at her like that, as if he… cared. (He thought she was extraordinary.)

"I haven't finished it," she hastily added. The book was easier, safer, to talk about. It wasn't technically untrue, she told herself. She _was_ in the middle of _Heat Wave_ ; he didn't need to know that she was in the middle of rereading it. Just as he absolutely did not need to know that she'd finished _Heat Wave_ in one night or that she'd felt her entire body react to Page 105 or that she'd… kind of been amazed at Nikki Heat—he'd really seen her like that?

"Oh. Busy with cases?"

She managed a small shrug. "You know how it is."

Well, he'd used to know how it was, since he'd been shadowing her.

"Yeah," he agreed briefly, something flickering across his expression that looked rather like… wistfulness, even melancholy. As if he… missed working at the precinct.

Maybe… did he want to come back? He'd seemed… eager to come back during the last case but then he'd walked away and stayed away and he was done with the book so it wasn't like he needed to do more research.

But then thinking about what he'd said in the dedication, his words about his friends at the 12th, she couldn't help but wonder… And she might have, kind of, gotten used to him being around and he hadn't been… terrible to work with and he'd even been helpful, surprisingly so, as much as she didn't like to admit it, so it would be… better, for the victims, to get justice…

It would be for the victims, she told herself. (Liar.) _Shut up._

"Listen, Beckett, I… was thinking…" he began.

She suddenly found it a little hard to breathe. Had her dress somehow gotten tighter? It was something about his expression, the look in his eyes. He looked so serious and a little nervous. "Yeah?"

"I… wanted to tell yo—"

"Rick!" A voice cut across whatever he'd been about to say and he started a little and she turned to see a young guy come bounding up, clapping Castle on the shoulder. "Rick, you lucky son of a gun! I've heard some rumors and I have to ask, which would you rather write, a certain British secret agent or more Nikki Heat?"

Certain British—what? Her thoughts stuttered. What? Was that really a reference to—was Castle really going to—

Castle laughed a little, his expression having immediately fallen into his familiar, cocky smirk, and shrugged. "Oh, now, that's like asking a parent to choose between his kids and anyway, it's not up to me, you know."

"Yeah, but getting to write Bo—"

"Ah ah, don't say it," Castle interrupted. "Don't want to jinx it, you know."

The attempt at being coy was utterly belied by his self-satisfied look. He was done with Nikki Heat. He was moving on. (Why did she care?)

The guy gave an obvious, exaggerated man-to-man sort of wink, nudging Castle. "I get it, I get it. Well, I can see you're busy so I'll leave you to it but I wanted to stop in, say congratulations. _Heat Wave_ looks like another big one for you."

"Thanks. Good to see you, Steve."

This Steve left with a wave, leaving Beckett feeling distinctly colder. She should have brought a wrap to wear over this dress.

Castle looked a little sheepish, the smugness dropping from his expression as quickly as it had appeared, as he turned back to her. "Sorry about that. He writes for one of the mystery magazines and is something of a fan, as you could probably tell."

"Certain British secret agent?" she asked instead. "Was he talking about—are you really going to write about James Bond?"

He shifted, looking a little uncertain. "Well, it's been… mentioned. I got an offer to write him but I haven't… well, nothing's been settled yet."

"Wow. Congratulations," she managed to say, forcing a bright smile. "That's… great."

Really. So great. Richard Castle as the new Ian Fleming. Even she could see what a big deal that was. James Bond was world-famous, timeless, iconic. No run-of-the-mill cop could possibly compare.

He might say nothing had been settled but really, only an idiot or a lunatic would turn down an offer to write Bond with the attendant publicity and the guaranteed best-seller status.

So he wasn't going to write another Nikki Heat. Not that she wanted him to, hadn't asked him to write the first one. And she didn't care so why did it matter to her?

He gave a small smile. "Yeah, thanks. I mean, it would mean not writing another Nikki Heat—"

Her heart seemed to stutter a little. Another Nikki Heat… "Were you planning to? Write another, I mean."

"Well, I… Do you think I should write another?"

She forced a scoff. "Oh, please, it's not like I asked you to write the first one." She didn't care. And if he didn't want to write another Nikki Heat, then she certainly didn't want him to. And she hadn't missed him and she didn't want him to come back. And she didn't even like him anyway.

His expression darkened. "Well, I'm sorry if it's been such a hardship to have a character based on you. Some people might find it flattering."

Flattering! (She might have been. A little bit. To be called extraordinary. And reading about Nikki. But she was damn well not admitting it.) "Oh please. Do you have any idea how much grief I've had to put up with because of your fictional cop with a stripper name?" It was hard enough being a female cop to begin with. But being a female cop known to have inspired a fictional one with a name like Nikki Heat!

"Nikki Heat is not a stripper name! And anyway, you can be relieved then since after this, I won't be writing about her anymore. Not that there was much more to the character anyway."

Not more to the character! Well, if he wanted to turn her into a cardboard cutout! He could go back to his millionaire playboy life surrounded by sycophant bimbos and leave her to her life and it served her right for even starting to think that it wasn't bad to have him around and maybe—well, no more. He would be gone for good and good riddance. "Oh, there's plenty to the character! She just needs a better writer!"

"A better writer, ha! As if there's a line of writers just waiting to write about her!"

"You're lucky I promised to cooperate for the benefit of press coverage, Castle," she hissed. "Otherwise I might have to shoot you."

"You didn't have to come to the party. It's not like I wanted you to come anyway."

"I told you, Captain Montgomery insisted. So I'm here but he didn't say I needed to talk to you so bye. Have a nice life!" Not.

She stalked off, fuming. The arrogant ass! She should have shot him months ago. How dare he call her extraordinary and then look at her as if he meant it and then just drop her the moment a better offer came along. Well, fine, then.

She should never have even let him in, in the first place. Should never have started to think he might be more than the jackass playboy. Should never have told him about her mother or started to find his stupid jokes and ridiculous theories funny. Should never have started to like him.

Well, no more. It wasn't like she'd wanted him around. She'd been quite satisfied with her life before he'd ever barged into it and she'd be fine again without him, better even. She'd be great!

She ignored the sharp sting of hurt—no, not hurt, it wasn't hurt. It was anger, yes, that was what was corroding her insides and making the back of her eyes prick. Anger. Fury, even.

That was all.

 _~To be continued…~_

A/N 2: Um, yeah… *runs and hides*


	3. Chapter 3

Author's Note: Starting to fix things…

 **Because You Were Gone**

 _Chapter 3_

Castle stared after Beckett for a split second before he turned sharply and stalked off.

He caught someone's eye and forced a smile, belatedly realizing that since it was his launch party, he was going to be the cynosure of attention.

Which meant he couldn't just sneak out and punch a few walls or something. He'd need to stick around and make nice. And possibly make it up to Paula and accept the Bond offer and forget he'd ever so much as created a character named Nikki Heat, let alone met anyone named Kate Beckett.

And he didn't love her. He couldn't love her. He flat out refused to love someone so… so… infuriating. Even now, he felt like his head might explode from frustration and anger.

Thank god Steve had interrupted when he had, even though Castle had been hard-pressed not to tell Steve to shove off at the time. Now, he might need to send Steve a case of Chateauneuf du Pape or something. No damn way he wanted to humiliate himself by apologizing to a woman who hated him, hated the character she'd inspired, and didn't care that he thought her extraordinary.

Well, fine. He'd never forced his company on a woman who despised him and he wasn't about to start now. He didn't need Kate Beckett or any woman. He was just fine on his own.

He caught another fan's eyes only to have hers skitter away and he belatedly realized he was scowling, again. Damn it.

He needed to stop feeling so furious so he could go back to his real job of making nice with his fans. Since _some_ people actually thought he was a good writer and valued his company.

He glanced around, looking for a familiar head of red hair. Alexis. She was always the one person whose company he sought out when his spirit had been abraded by, well, just about anything, bad reviews, boredom, Gina, his mother. Beckett. Yes, he needed Alexis. The one person who never made him feel lacking, the one person whose love and trust he'd never doubted. A few minutes with her and he'd be fine again, could play nice for this party.

His eyes found the flash of red hair and he turned in that direction, only to have his steps hitch for a moment as he took in who she was talking to. Oh.

Not perfect timing. Alexis was sitting at one of the small tables scattered around at the sides of the room talking to Esposito and Ryan. As nice as it was to see that Alexis was smiling and chatting with men he trusted as opposed to, say, talking to a teenage boy, he'd wanted to be distracted so he wouldn't think about Beckett anymore. Which was obviously not happening.

Well, this was going to be a little awkward.

But he decided that his wish to be in his daughter's presence outweighed any awkwardness at having to talk to Beckett's partners now and so he went on.

Besides, Esposito and Ryan were his friends too, never mind Beckett.

Alexis turned to smile at him as he slid into a chair beside her, slinging his arm around her and tugging her into his side. "Taking a break from the adoring masses?"

"It's tiring to be so popular," he quipped, feeling the tight knot of anger and frustration in his chest ease just from her smile. He turned his smile, a real one this time, to Esposito and Ryan. "Hey, guys."

"Castle."

"Nice party, Castle," Ryan grinned, lifting his glass in a mock toast.

"Thanks. I see you're taking advantage of the open bar."

"No other reason to come here," Esposito retorted.

"Yeah, 'cause Esposito's illiterate," Ryan chimed in.

Castle laughed as Espo elbowed Ryan. Yeah, he'd missed this, the good-natured ribbing and snark that masked the real strength of the partnership.

"Just for that, bro, you're getting the first round next time we go to a bar."

"Why wait? I'll just get the next round here," Ryan offered.

Espo narrowed his eyes. "It's an open bar so it doesn't count."

"It counts to me. Still alcohol, right?"

"Doesn't count unless you pay for it. Right, Castle?"

"Unless you cops have different rules," he responded.

Alexis interrupted this exchange by laughing and then ducking out from under his arm. "Okay, I think I'll leave you guys to debate this. Dad, I see Taylor so I'm going to go talk to her. Have fun. Bye, Detectives."

"Bye, Alexis."

"Later, little Castle," was Espo's contribution.

Alexis flitted off, weaving her way through the crowd.

"She's a good kid," Ryan commented.

"Yeah, amazing she's related to you," Espo jibed.

Castle only grinned, restored to himself by the banter and the compliment to Alexis. "I often think so." He paused. "So what's new? You guys have a case right now?"

"What, Beckett didn't tell you?"

Damn. Of course Espo would have to mention Beckett. "No." He tried not to frown.

"You might like this one, Castle," Ryan interjected. "Czech illegal, found down a manhole."

"Yeah?"

"Mm. And so far, just dead ends really. The guy who was seen arguing with the vic the day of her murder just alibied out," Espo grumbled.

Hmm. "Really…"

"Yeah. We could use a crazy theory, Castle," Ryan quipped. "I think even Beckett was thinking that earlier."

He perked up even though he told himself he shouldn't and shouldn't care. "Really? Did she say something?" He tried—but knew he failed—to sound only mildly interested.

"Not so's you'd notice."

"Yeah, Beckett's not exactly what you'd call a sharer," Ryan agreed. "But I think she might miss having you around."

His heart—stupid organ that it was (was it so eager to be broken?)—leaped in spite of himself. "Really?"

Espo made a disgusted sort of sound. "He might've been reading too many girly magazines."

"Shut up. There's the coffee and the thing with the chair."

Castle sat forward, his heart starting to pound with almost painful hope in his chest. (Yeah, he was not doing a stellar job of pretending he didn't care anymore. Clearly, he sucked at not caring about Beckett.) "The thing with the chair?"

Espo shrugged. "Okay, so she might have noticed you weren't around. Don't know if I'd go so far as to say she missed you."

He deflated a little. Espo knew Beckett the best, had been working with her longest. "Beckett notices everyone and everything. It's sort of her job, after all, detecting." And if Beckett had missed him, she'd sure done a damn fine job of hiding it earlier.

But then, as Ryan had said, Beckett was not exactly a sharer. She didn't let people in, didn't show emotions easily. And she had pride enough to dwarf the Rocky Mountains.

Hmm. He couldn't say he didn't know what that was like. Hiding emotions and vulnerability out of pride…

It was Ryan's turn to elbow Esposito. "Explain the chair, then, hot shot."

"We don't know Beckett did anything about that."

"It's called deduction, you might try it once in awhile," Ryan retorted.

Castle cut in before this could devolve into one of their usual little squabbles. "Since I still have no clue what you're talking about, care to enlighten me? What about the coffee and the chair? Just tell me the facts, that's all. Not asking you to guess what Beckett's thinking," he added, more for Espo's benefit. "I just want the evidence."

Espo sat back, gesturing at Ryan. "Let him tell you about the coffee. He's the one that mentioned it. I don't think it's a thing."

Ryan shrugged a little. "Not much to tell except that for the first couple weeks after you left, Beckett refused to use your coffee machine. Went back to drinking the sludge out of the old machine."

Castle gave an involuntary grimace and shudder at the memory. The only benefit to that so-called beverage was that it was so toxic that just the after-taste in your mouth would be enough to keep anyone awake and if you survived it, you might be immune from other poisonous substances too. And Beckett, the one who mainlined coffee and bought her own from a specialty coffee shop every morning, had gone back to using that old machine? When she had a choice? That didn't bode well for him at all. God, she really might hate him.

"Except a couple weeks ago, she went back to using your machine again."

"That don't mean nothing," Espo denied. "It's just coffee and you know how Beckett is about that."

Ryan shot a look at Espo. "She drank the old sludge for a few weeks after Castle left so you think, what, she decided she liked the sludge better just for those weeks and then realized it was gross? Come on."

Castle tried—and failed—to suppress the hope kindling inside him. It was just coffee. It was silly to be making such a thing out of it. And yet… He had brought her coffee in the mornings. And he was the one that had bought that machine and Beckett had, at first, made an (adorable) pretense at not wanting to try it. And if he knew anything about Beckett at all, her starting to use his coffee machine again was a sign of softening towards him.

"And what was that about the chair?" he asked.

"The chair you always sat in by Beckett's desk," Espo supplied.

Oh, that chair. The uncomfortable one with no cushion left to speak of, that seemed designed to make his every muscle stiffen up after only minutes of sitting in it. The chair he'd ridiculously started to miss sitting in (crazy as it sounded). The chair in which he'd sat watching Beckett, the play of expression across her face, the way her eyes lit up when she had an idea, the graceful dance of her slim fingers across the keyboard. (Shit. He was in so much trouble.)

"Yeah, that one," Ryan continued. "It just stayed by her desk, as usual, but then one day a couple weeks ago, Stegner moved it when she had to talk to a witness and the conference room was busy. Beckett was out running down a lead at the time but when she came back and saw the chair had moved, she didn't look happy about it."

"Really?" Castle sternly tamped down the urge to smile. He seemed to remember Beckett making a few snipes about his chair getting into her work space at first.

"Beckett doesn't like it when people touch her stuff, period," Espo broke in. "Remember the look she gave that rookie McPherson when he tried to fiddle with those elephants on her desk?"

The face Ryan made was eloquent. "Yeah. Poor guy. Bit of an idiot, admittedly, Montgomery kicked him down to traffic later but that look, I'm pretty sure he probably still sees Beckett's look in nightmares."

Castle spared this unknown rookie a sympathetic grimace. He was well aware of some of Beckett's looks that could have seared the paint off the walls.

"Anyway," Ryan went on, "Beckett wasn't happy about the chair being moved but she didn't say anything."

"She wouldn't, though," Espo interjected. "Not her way."

No, that was true enough.

"But next morning when we came in, the chair had been moved back to beside Beckett's desk as if it had never left. And Beckett was sitting at her desk as if she hadn't noticed a thing. But," Ryan paused and allowed himself a small smile, "I checked and Stegner said she didn't move it and Paderewski downstairs said Beckett was the first one in that morning, like usual, so…"

"Circumstantial evidence," Espo retorted.

"I didn't know you knew any words longer than two syllables," Ryan shot back.

"An-noy-ing ass," Espo enunciated the words with deliberate care.

Ryan only grinned and turned back to Castle. "Anyway, so I say she misses you. 'Sides, I'm pretty sure there've been times in the last weeks where she's paused sort of like she's waiting for a response or a comment but you haven't been there to say anything."

Espo snorted. "Irish here is imagining things."

"And how do you explain the chair, Super-cop? Did it move by itself?"

"It's a piece of furniture. For all I know, the janitors could have moved it back."

"Yeah, like the janitors ever move stuff around like that."

Ryan had a point.

The story that made the evidence make sense, he thought. Espo might not acknowledge or think much of symbolism but Castle was a writer and he knew Beckett understood it too.

The coffee machine he had bought for the precinct. The chair he had always sat in.

And what had he really been expecting? That Kate Beckett would admit in so many words that she might have missed him? When pigs sprouted wings and flew.

Espo pointed a finger at Ryan. "You, go get us more drinks." And then at Castle. "You, I want a word with."

Ryan made a face but stood up anyway while Espo also stood up and none too gently grabbed Castle by the arm to yank him up as well.

Castle didn't like this but mostly to avoid a scene (and okay, out of curiosity too), he followed Espo over to an empty corner of the ballroom.

He tried for a smirk. "What's up, Espo?"

Espo did not look amused. "What the hell were you thinking, man? I should never have let you look at that file."

Castle's forced smile dropped off his face. "Yeah, well, too late for that," he retorted, suddenly annoyed. Esposito did not get to act all righteous when he was the one that had gotten Castle into Archives to look at the Johanna Beckett case file in the first place. If he hadn't, none of this mess could have happened. (Okay, so Castle had been the one to call up Clark Murray but still.)

"I thought you'd just—" Espo broke off abruptly and then went on, "I didn't think you'd do anything with it without checking with Beckett first. Come on, dude, it's her _mom's_ case."

Castle sighed. Espo had a point there. He should have asked first. But he'd always been a 'Better to ask forgiveness than permission' person and now it had blown up in his face. Of course, he realized, with a sinking heart, he hadn't exactly asked forgiveness. Yet. "Look, Espo, seriously, do you think Beckett will let me back if I ask?" he blurted out.

Espo eyed him. "You want to come back?"

"I didn't want to leave in the first place. I only left 'cause Beckett insisted and I figured I'd done enough damage."

Espo made a small face. "I hate to say it but Ryan might not be wrong."

Quite the concession. Castle felt a wan flicker of amusement.

"Look, this is between you and Beckett. If she lets you back, I ain't gonna stand in the way. But," Espo paused and fixed Castle with a look, not quite Beckett-level but intimidating enough. "If she lets you back and you hurt her again, no one will ever find your body. Got it?"

Castle tried not to visibly gulp as he nodded. "Got it." He knew Espo's loyalty to Beckett and he had a bad feeling that Espo wasn't joking. But well, he'd never wanted to hurt Beckett, would never have wanted that. And he had the lowering feeling that he'd happily spend the rest of his life ensuring Beckett was never hurt like that again. (Which didn't bode well for his vulnerable heart.)

Espo nodded. "Good."

With that, Espo turned and walked away.

"Hey, Espo, thanks." Espo nodded and Castle looked back at the table and gave Ryan a wave and then set out to find Beckett. Or not find Beckett so much as just head in her direction because he seemed to have developed a sixth sense of awareness for Beckett so he always knew where she was and his eyes found her immediately.

She was standing at the bar on the other side of the ballroom and just the sight of her even at that distance made his chest feel tight, as if something had reached in to squeeze his heart. (And he didn't need a cardiologist to tell him that his physical reaction to the sight of her didn't exactly support his not-in-love-with-Beckett thesis. He was doomed.)

His poor defenseless heart was too vulnerable where she was concerned. Which was the problem. Now that his anger had faded, he could acknowledge that, why he'd said and done what he had earlier in talking to Beckett. He'd just been so terrifyingly conscious of his own vulnerability to her that he'd wanted to prod her into making an admission first, to spare his own pride. But this was Beckett and to his knowledge, she'd likely never conceded anything without a fight in her life. So his ploy hadn't worked and he… hadn't reacted well, to say the least.

Pride and a temper did not a good combination make, especially when mixed in with the need to defend his own vulnerable emotions, making him lash out, offense being the best defense and all that.

It didn't help that Beckett got under his skin so easily, in a way almost no one else did. And he'd already started out by feeling naked and exposed after she'd read the dedication (and it wasn't as if the book itself was a subtle tribute to her.) Plus he'd been hurt and disappointed that she apparently couldn't even be bothered to finish the book that was based on her when he'd sent it to her almost a month ago (and after he'd gone to the trouble of wheedling Black Pawn into allowing him to send her an advance copy in the first place.)

So maybe there was blame to go around on both their parts in their fight tonight but he had been the one in the wrong first, had never apologized for looking into her mom's case. And he'd promised Alexis he would. To show that he cared more about Beckett's hurt than he did about his own pride.

He squared his shoulders, got a firm grip on his self-control and his temper, and headed towards Beckett. _Time to man up, Rick, and take responsibility for your own actions._

And if Beckett gave him a second chance, he would do better, he promised himself. Less of the jackass playboy act and more the real him, Alexis's dad, the version of himself he was at home.

He had to do better—because the alternative was giving up on Beckett entirely and possibly never seeing her again and that wasn't an option he was willing to accept. Not now, not yet. (Not ever.)

 _~To be continued…~_

 _A/N 2: Thank you, as always, for reading. I hope everyone who celebrates it has a very happy Thanksgiving._


	4. Chapter 4

Author's Note: Fixing things…

 **Because You Were Gone**

 _Chapter 4_

Kate took a long drink, savoring the burn of the alcohol down her throat, as she counted down the minutes until she could plausibly claim that she'd stayed long enough to show the NYPD's cooperation with the _Heat Wave_ publicity campaign. She figured she had to stick around for at least another half hour, probably longer than that, until she'd been at the party for a full hour at least before she could even think about leaving.

And then with any luck, she might never need to be reminded of Nikki Heat or a certain writer ever again.

The moment she got back home, she was dumping his books into a box. She was tempted to go a step further and dump said box into the trash but she couldn't go that far. Not knowing what some of his books had meant to her, not knowing that one of his books had a message in it that had kept her going through some hard times and another had been signed _To Johanna. Thanks for reading._

The reminder had her knocking back another gulp of her drink. Damn the man anyway. How dare he taint her memory of what his books had meant to her? (Not that he had any idea. Not that she would ever ever tell him.)

And damn Lanie for deserting her. She shot a narrow-eyed look at Lanie, who was flirting with a tall, good-looking man and looked to be disgustingly satisfied with her current situation. Never mind that Kate herself had been the one to give Lanie permission to go off and talk to the guy when she'd noticed him eyeing Lanie. (Whatever happened to female solidarity? Lanie wasn't supposed to take Kate at her word and actually leave, Kate grumbled to herself disgruntledly. Ignoring the fact that she normally hated people who were so indecisive and irrational. Ugh. She blamed him for that too, she decided. In her current state, she was quite ready to blame him for everything including the weather.)

Given the way her night was going, she really shouldn't have been surprised when he appeared beside her.

"What?" she snapped. "If you want a drink, there's another bar at the other side of the room. Or did you just want to annoy me some more?"

She ignored a twinge of guilt at the way his eyes darkened so he looked… wounded. He didn't look angry anymore.

He blinked and took a breath and shot a glance at the bartender, who wasn't doing a very good job of pretending disinterest, before saying, "Can we talk?"

Well, she didn't want to cause a scene. That wouldn't look good. "Fine," she agreed, not very graciously.

She accompanied him to a small table a little ways away, hating the way she noticed his height and his shoulders and the faint whiff of his cologne. (It should be against the law for someone so annoying to also be so damn attractive, she decided.)

He pulled a chair out for her to sit down and she sat, trying not to care about this display of courtesy that she had to admit she probably didn't deserve at the moment.

He sat down too and there was an awkward pause during which she tried not to stare at his neck and throat, left bare by his lack of a tie, only that was easier than looking at his eyes or, worse, his mouth. (Damn it.)

She changed her mind and forced her eyes up to meet his. She wasn't going to be intimidated away from looking at his eyes. "Well?" Her tone was deliberately coolly polite.

"Before… uh, when I was being an idiot, there was something I forgot to say."

Still angry, still angry. Nope, damn it, it was slipping away from her, even as she tried to grasp at the last shreds of anger. She'd forgotten—or not allowed herself to think about—how disarming Castle could be when he tried.

"Permission to revise and extend what I said before?" He gave her a hesitant, pleading look from his damnable blue eyes. And her traitorous heart softened. (When had she become so susceptible to a pair of blue eyes?)

"Since when do you ask permission to talk?" she returned but there was no bite in the tone, making it a tease. And she knew he knew it because his eyes brightened, his expression easing a little.

"Before… what I was going to say when Steve interrupted us… I'm sorry."

His eyes, his voice, were utterly sincere and she was finding it hard to breathe. She wasn't used to this Castle, to this serious version of him who wasn't hiding his real regret and remorse. No justifications, no excuses, just sincerity. She had no defenses against this version of Castle.

"What I did, looking into your mom's case, was wrong. I violated your trust, I opened old wounds, and I did not respect your wishes. I shouldn't have done it and you deserve to know that I'm very, very sorry."

The hard knot of anger and hurt that seemed to have taken up residence in her chest for the last six weeks (more) dissolved, the poison of betrayal lanced from the wound allowing it to heal.

"And I'm sorry too about what I said about Nikki Heat." He paused. "It wasn't true. There's plenty to the character. I'm pretty sure I could write 50 books about the character and still not have explored the character fully," The character or her? From the way he was looking at her, it wasn't even a question that he was talking about both. Her heart was certainly reacting as if he'd said he was talking about her outright. ( _The extraordinary KB…_ )

He hesitated, looking a little more nervous now. "And you don't have to agree and if you don't want to see me again after tonight, I'll agree but… I meant what I said in the dedication and I want you to know that those months of working with you were really… great and… whatever happens with Bond or anything else, I don't want to just walk away from you or the 12th or the work we did."

Her heart was thrashing around in her chest like a trapped bird trying to escape. "You…" She paused and had to lick her suddenly dry lips (and tried not to notice the way his eyes darted down to her mouth) before finishing, "you want to come back?"

Now, for the first time, his lips eased into the barest hint of a smile. Not one of his cocky smirks but a small, tentative, hopeful thing. "If you'll let me."

"But what about Bond?" He wanted to come back, wanted to work with her—everyone at the 12th—again...

He shrugged a little. "Nothing's been settled yet and if need be, I can work with you and write at the same time, like I did for _Heat Wave_. It might even help, give the dialogue a more natural feel to interact with other people than if I was just sitting at home all day, talking to myself to work out the lines." His lips quirked into a faint self-deprecating smile and she allowed herself to echo it.

"The voice of experience?"

He nodded a little, his smile widening. "There were a couple years when Alexis was in pre-school. Spending most of my time reading lots of little kid books with Alexis and having tea parties with Alexis's dolls was not conducive to writing realistic adult dialogue, shall we say."

She didn't even try to hold back her laugh, the reminder of his devotion to his daughter (and the mental image of him attending tea parties with Alexis's dolls) finishing the job until the last lingering shards of doubt were entirely dissolved. She forgave him and she wouldn't mind him coming back and she… kind of liked him too. A little. "Well, then, I guess… you'd better get caught up on our current case."

Oh god, his eyes, his smile… He couldn't have looked any happier if she'd handed him a Pulitzer. "Ryan mentioned that she was a Czech illegal immigrant and had an argument with someone the day she died but he alibied out?"

She should have known the boys would mention something. Well, they were at something of an impasse now that Dr. Talbot had alibied out so maybe it was time for a crazy theory after all. Or one of Castle's less-crazy insights. "Yeah. Eliska Sokol is the vic's name and she'd been working as a housekeeper at this high-end condo building," she began, running through the main points of the case, the vic's connection to the Talbots, the weird incident with the Talbot boy, Dr. Talbot's story of the affair, and his alibi.

He made a small face. "Hmm."

"What?" She knew that face. It was his skeptical face, the dissatisfied-with-the-story face.

"Do you believe this Dr. Talbot's story?"

"He seemed believable enough. Commented that it was humiliating telling me and asking that I not mention it to his wife."

"Mm, maybe. You were there and I wasn't but just hearing it, I don't know."

"Why not? What are you thinking?" As much as she hated to admit it, Castle's insights into people were usually spot-on when he wasn't going off on one of his conspiracy-minded riffs.

"I just—I know an affair is the first thing to come to mind when it comes to a married man and an argument with a woman not his wife but I don't like it. It's a cliché."

"Clichés become clichés for a reason, Castle," she pointed out, trying not to notice the little flicker of something she didn't want to admit might be happiness at once again bouncing ideas off of Castle, talking about a case like this. Theorizing with the boys just didn't have the same… zing or something. Espo was a "just the facts, ma'am" sort of cop and Ryan didn't have Castle's creative mind. Maybe it was just Castle's particular brand of crazy but something about the way his mind worked struck sparks off of hers. She really had missed this, missed him, hadn't she?

"I know but in this case, these circumstances, I don't buy it. Dr. Talbot is, from what you said, a rich, successful doctor and the victim was on the cleaning staff or something at his hospital?"

"Yeah," she confirmed. "He said that's where they met and started talking."

"I don't buy it. I've talked to quite a few doctors over the years, research for ways to kill people. Also dated a—" he broke off. "Never mind. Anyway, my point is that there's a hierarchy in hospitals as there is in any workplace. Doctors get their own cafeteria, their own break room, their own separate parking lot; they don't exactly have to mingle with the commoners, if you know what I mean. Doctors and nurses, sure, I've watched _General Hospital_ , that happens all the time but they work together every day; it's the effects of propinquity. I just don't really believe that the vic, as a janitor basically, would ever have been in a situation where she would be able to talk to Dr. Talbot for any length of time."

"So what's your theory then? Why was Dr. Talbot arguing with the vic?"

"Well, maybe the vic noticed Dr. Talbot doing something wrong, criminal, when she was working at the hospital and she decided she needed to look into him further, make sure she really saw what she thought she did, something like that. Ooh, I like that, the victim as a freelance investigator into the shady doctor."

She sternly suppressed a smile. He had that excited spark in his eyes, the one he always got when he came up with a good story. It was… nice to see it again. "Uh huh and how do you explain the fact that he has an alibi?"

"The alibi's from his nurse, who, one might say, has a vested interest in keeping her employer out of jail. She might be covering for him."

"Nice theory but you've got no proof." She let a tiny smirk escape her at this familiar exchange. This felt so… like them again.

He waved a dismissive hand. "Eh, that's what Espo and Ryan are for, tracking down leads, detecting, right?"

"Do they know you're volunteering them for that?"

"I won't be; you'll tell them," he shot back immediately.

She bit back another smile at this easy assumption of his old place on the team, as her… partner. "So tomorrow then?"

Unlike her, he didn't even try to hide his smile. "Tomorrow."

Now she gave into her smile, her eyes meeting and holding his for a beat too long, until she looked away, took a hasty sip of her drink, frantically tried to think of something to say that was neutral.

She hadn't come up with anything but, perhaps unsurprisingly, he did, sitting back as he asked with rather overdone nonchalance, "So, uh, any interesting cases I missed while I was gone?"

One case came to mind along with something she could mention. She hadn't been going to but she hadn't been planning on having any amicable conversations with him. "Actually, yes. We had a case involving a model who was murdered during Fashion Week."

"Ooh. I like it. It's Fashion Week and the clothes are to die for," he said dramatically.

She rolled her eyes a little. Trust Castle to get in a lame joke like that. "I met a friend of yours while working the case."

"Oh, really? Who?"

"Her name's Rina." Rina had basically walked up to Kate and introduced herself, having just picked up the _Cosmo_ issue about Nikki Heat. At the time, Kate had been annoyed to have a reminder of Castle shoved into her face in the middle of a case—could she not get away from the man? But Rina had turned out to be a helpful source of information.

"Rina," he repeated, a faint frown creasing his brow as he clearly tried to pull up a memory of a face to attach to the name.

"She was another model, like the vic," Kate added, just to give him a little bit of a hard time. "She said she knew you." The implication of how he knew this so-called "friend" was clear and she saw it hit him, the faint shadow of something like embarrassment flickering across his eyes. It wasn't too mean to take a little bit of revenge after all the heartac—no, her heart wasn't involved—just... emotions he'd caused her, right?

"Oh. Ah, well, it's been awhile since I've really been on the party circuit," he finally said, not quite easily.

She let her little smirk show as she relented. "She said she used to babysit for Alexis."

He straightened. "Babysit!"

He narrowed his eyes at her a little and she met his look with one of bland innocence. It wasn't her fault if he'd made assumptions.

"Rina," he repeated again, consideringly. "I don't—wait, I think I remember a _Katrina_ who used to babysit for Alexis. Is that—"

"Blonde, big brown eyes, looks like she's maybe 21," Kate supplied helpfully (sort of).

"Huh. I guess it must be the same girl but wow. Katrina became a model?"

"She's cute. Young and cute," Kate added. "She might be able to make it. She's got the innocent look with the big brown eyes going for her. It would be an asset for some types of modeling. Some campaigns need a more sophisticated or exotic look but some want the innocent schoolgirl look." She shut her mouth. She was saying too much.

"Interesting," Castle commented and she tried not to look self-conscious. Maybe he hadn't noticed or thought anything of it. Or assumed she'd come across a case involving a model before. "The Katrina I remember was a gangly teen with a ponytail and braces but then she graduated high school and left for college and Alexis was getting a little too old to need a babysitter often anyway."

She relaxed. Oh good. He hadn't thought anything of it. It occurred to her that it was… flattering the way he so easily assumed it was natural for her to be so knowledgeable about various things. ( _Extraordinary_ … The word flitted through her mind.)

"I wonder if Alexis knows. I'll mention it to her. But first, tell me about the case. What happened to the vic?"

Kate sobered. "Oh. It was one of those unnecessary tragedies, a big terrible misunderstanding." She told him the story, the victim and her husband, country kids looking to make it big in the city, the web of nastiness they'd encountered, the final misunderstanding.

When she finished, Castle was sober too, his eyes dark with all the capacity for empathy that was so much a part of him. (She liked that too.) "Oh god, that's awful."

"Yeah."

Castle was silent for a long minute in which she could tell he was thinking about the tragedy of it all.

"If it helps, Teddy Farrow said he'd see to it that the creep photographer and that so-called friend will never be able to work in the industry again."

"Poetic justice. As a writer, I guess I can live with that."

She smiled faintly. "Well, you know, you're the one who likes finding the silver lining."

"So I do. Thanks for telling me." He paused and then added, sobering, "Say, do you happen to have Katrina's—or I suppose I should say Rina's—number still?"

"I think so. Why?"

"Oh, you know, Alexis might enjoy getting to catch up with her old babysitter. They got along well."

He sounded a little too casual and she narrowed her eyes at him. "Right. No other reason?" It wasn't—could not be—for a date or something like that. Rina had been Alexis's babysitter and Castle might be a playboy but he wasn't sleazy.

"Oh, well…" He shifted, looking a little self-conscious. Adorably so. ( _Shut up. No, he wasn't._ ) "I was just thinking… if Rina's in the modeling world and after what you just told me… It sounds like Jenna would have been safer if she'd had a real friend to turn to, someone looking out for her a little."

"Yeah, well, in the modeling world, for the most part it's everyone for him or herself."

"Yeah, but someone outside that world…"

"Castle, what are you planning?"

"Planning? Nothing. Not really," he amended. "Just thinking I might give Rina a call, have her and Alexis reconnect…"

"And?"

"Rina's a nice kid. She isn't equipped for the cut-throat world so I just figure… she and Alexis can reconnect and that way, well," he shrugged with rather overblown casualness, "if Rina ever feels like she needs someone looking out for her, she'll know where to go." He paused and then added with his more usual smirk, "Besides, it's not like it'll be a hardship for me to have an excuse to hang out with models for a bit."

She forced a sardonic little snort. "Yeah, I bet you wouldn't mind that."

He gave one of his annoying, smug looks.

A nice attempt but a little late for that. And she knew he knew it, wasn't trying to fool her. He wasn't that stupid. It was just habit to try and deflect attention from sincerity. It occurred to her that this side of him, the jackass side of him, was mostly an act. He was good at it but it wasn't really him, Rick Castle. A real jackass would never have apologized the way he had. A real jackass wouldn't care about the victims or be concerned about Rina in the cutthroat modeling world. No, now that she thought about it, her view of him no longer clouded by anger and hurt, she could recognize the glimpses she'd seen of the real man Castle was behind the jackass persona. She didn't doubt his ability to be annoying was quite real but for all that, for all his impulsiveness and his wisecracks, he was more than that. He was… a nice man, even a good man. One who so clearly adored his daughter and loved his mother.

One who would have looked into her mom's case to try to _help her_ by solving the case that haunted her entire life. Oh. She hadn't seen it like that, hadn't let herself see it like that in the surge of hurt and betrayal and, yes, fear. But with her anger gone—and with evidence of Castle's kindness, his instinct to help people, at the forefront of her mind—she could acknowledge it. And it mattered. Knowing why mattered. He hadn't, as she'd already realized, known what her mom's case had done to her before; of course he would have assumed she was desperate to solve her mother's case, the same way she tried to solve every one of the cases assigned to her. And he'd tried to help her. And that meant something, in some way mitigated the wrong he had done. She had already forgiven him but now, she could, if not forget, understand, the last lingering sore spots from the wound healing.

And he had apologized so sincerely for having hurt her. Even after she'd snapped at him and generally baited him into losing his temper. Not her finest moment.

It took courage, strength, to admit wrongdoing, Kate knew, and Castle had done it. Not only that, he'd overcome his pride to be the one to reach out to her, to acknowledge he'd been in the wrong. And he'd taken back what he'd said in the heat of anger.

Which was more than she had done. Even after his apology.

He might have owed her the apology for looking into her mom's case but for the fight they'd had earlier tonight, well, there was blame to share for that. And she might owe him an apology for what she'd said too. She'd been… mean and petty and, well, a jerk.

"Castle, I—"

"Rick!"

They both started a little and turned to see a woman with black hair approaching.

She heard Castle give a faint little sigh and glanced at him to see that he had straightened up and smoothed his expression into blandness. "Sorry about this," he muttered under his breath before he stood up to meet the woman. "Hey, Paula. Beckett, this is Paula, my agent. Paula, Detective Kate Beckett."

Paula spared Beckett a brief glance. "The real Nikki Heat, yes, hello." She turned her attention back to Castle. "Rick, we're not here for you to spend all your time hiding out in corners talking to your cop friends. This is your party; go out and mingle. Show off that famous charm, okay?"

"Yeah, Paula, I know. Just give me a second."

Castle gave Paula a look and, somewhat to Beckett's surprise given the decidedly peremptory way in which Paula had addressed Castle, Paula retreated. Huh. She hadn't quite thought—or realized—that Castle was capable of wielding such… authority, but it occurred to her, belatedly, that he must be more business-savvy than she'd ever expected of her annoying shadow since he did, after all, manage his career and had obviously done well at it. Paula, whatever her manner, worked for him and the woman knew it.

Castle turned back to Beckett, giving her an apologetic little smile. "Sorry, Beckett, but I really do need to go mingle some more."

She sternly tamped down the flicker of something like disappointment. She shouldn't want to monopolize Castle at his own book party; she'd been planning on a polite greeting and then nothing else. She managed a small smile. "Go, Castle. I get it."

She tried not to feel pleased that he didn't look happy to be leaving her. "Beckett, I…"

"I need to talk to Captain Montgomery and the boys anyway, tell them you'll be coming back," she offered, as he paused.

That made him brighten. "Okay. So, I guess, I'll see you tomorrow?"

"See you tomorrow, Castle," she confirmed, her silly traitorous heart fluttering at the sight of his smile. "Have fun with your groupies," she added teasingly.

He pulled an exaggeratedly beleaguered face that had her grinning but only said, "Until tomorrow, Beckett."

With that, he turned and left, leaving her to watch him go, eyeing his broad shoulders and back in his suit before she caught herself and pulled her gaze away. But she couldn't quite help the small smile playing around her lips, the flicker of warmth in her chest.

Tomorrow. Castle would be back tomorrow. He didn't want to leave her—the precinct, she corrected herself—after all.

And that was good. For the victims' sake. Of course. That was why she was a little glad to think of him coming back to the precinct. She could put up with a lot if it helped solve cases, she told herself virtuously.

And tried, very hard, to believe that was all it was.

 _~To be continued…~_

A/N 2: Castle volunteering to look out for Rina the way he did in "Inventing the Girl" is one of my favorite Castle moments and I've been trying to figure out a way to write Beckett finding out about it for years now and finally managed it!

Thank you all, as always, for reading and reviewing.


	5. Chapter 5

Author's Note: Moving forward (slowly).

 **Because You Were Gone**

 _Chapter 5_

In spite of herself, Kate felt a spurt of something perilously close to joy bubble up inside her chest the next morning when she looked up from her computer screen to see Castle walking into the bullpen again. Laden down with a box of donuts, which he proceeded to set down on Espo's desk, another white paper bag, and two coffees.

Cops were not generally the most demonstrative of people but even she could see that Castle was welcomed back cheerfully, even eagerly, by everyone (and not only because of the donuts), including the boys, who clapped him on the shoulder in turn and Captain Montgomery came out of his office to greet Castle too. Castle smiled and joked with his usual hail-fellow-well-met bonhomie and she didn't know why it did something to her, to see how easily Castle was accepted back into the camaraderie of cops. Maybe it was because she knew that cops were, at base, pragmatic and judged people largely by their usefulness on the job and Castle had proved himself so as to be accepted by everyone, not just the boys.

This was a famous multi-millionaire, she reminded herself, thinking about the glitziness of the party last night, who was entirely willing to spend most of his days in a not-at-all glamorous police station working alongside a bunch of cops whose yearly salaries wouldn't even be a drop in the bucket to him. Whatever Castle's faults, he was also surprisingly down-to-earth.

And then he was there, standing beside her desk, the corners of his eyes crinkled by his smile. "Good morning, Detective."

She had to school her expression into a mild smile, not the wide, bright beam she felt threatening to break free that would reveal entirely too much. Not that there was anything in particular to reveal. "Morning, Castle."

She accepted the coffee he handed her and hid her smile by taking a sip of it and then had to fight to keep her eyes from fluttering closed. Mm. Damn. How was it possible that the coffee he brought her seemed to taste better than any coffee she could ever buy or make for herself? It was ridiculous! And irrational! It was just coffee and she appreciated good coffee, that was all.

And she found that the paper bag contained two bear claws. The man had brought her breakfast as well. Again. Bribery of this sort should not work on her but damned if she didn't feel herself softening yet further. She might have missed this, his coffee and his persistent provision of pastries. (More alliteration, Castle's voice commented in her head. Argh.)

He was reviewing the murder board for the Sokol case, which gave her time to get her expression under control, before he turned back around. "So any new updates on the case, Beckett?"

As if on cue, Karpowski came up with the news that the victim's super had called, wanting to know if he could re-let the vic's old apartment and it should have been surprising, but somehow it wasn't, that it was Castle who picked up on the anomaly of the victim's rent being paid up through Friday when the victim had already been dead as of last Friday when her weekly rent was due.

With that news, the case picked up again and she and Castle were heading out to talk to the victim's super. Almost as if he'd never left.

So she was a little bit… pleased to have him back. He was company while in her car and waiting for the victim's so-called "friend" to show up to pick up the victim's mail.

Although he was, rather oddly, not chattering away to fill the silence. Until he blurted out, "a threatening letter."

Huh? "What?"

"I was just sitting here trying to figure out what was in the victim's mail that Mrs. Talbot, assuming she's this putative friend of the vic's, is so eager to retrieve. A threatening letter, a sort of 'keep your hands off my man' kind of thing since she must have believed the story about the affair."

"Irony is, it wouldn't have connected her to the crime. We don't open a victim's mail unless we have probable cause and a warrant first."

He threw her a strangely approving smile that made her cheeks warm in spite of herself. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"For using irony correctly. This is why I like spending time with you. Ever since that Alanis Morissette song came out, people use it when they really mean coincidence. Drives me nuts."

She managed a brief huff of laughter, tamping down on the way her heart fluttered. As compliments went, saying he liked to spend time with her because she used irony correctly was nothing to swoon over. And yet... Trust Castle to be so impressed by that. He was such a writer.

But speaking of his writing, there was something she owed him, something she needed to say after last night.

"Castle?"

He turned his head to look at her. "Hmm?"

God, he had the most deeply blue eyes she'd ever seen. While he'd been gone, she'd somehow forgotten or persuaded herself that his eyes couldn't possibly be as blue as she remembered but now, seeing him again, it was like a fresh surprise every time. He blinked and the motion somehow released her from her momentary distraction. "I… uh, liked _Heat Wave_."

He straightened up in his seat, a smile starting to curve his lips. "You finished it?"

"Yeah." She gave a small smile, her insides fluttering inside her. Outright praise wasn't her way, certainly not to him, but he'd called her extraordinary for the world to see, written an entire book to show it. "I think you did the NYPD proud."

He let out a breath. "Thanks, Beckett."

The words were commonplace but something about his expression, the look in his eyes, made them seem eloquent. Her lungs seemed to momentarily forget how to function at the thought that he really cared what her opinion was.

Cared… about spending time with h—no, cared about solving cases, she corrected herself. It wasn't about her. But still, it meant something that he'd voluntarily chosen—asked—to come back to the precinct. Even with all the dull moments in police work, the long hours spent waiting for warrants to be issued or evidence or leads to pan out with no guarantee that they'd be worth the wait, the grunt work aspects. He, who was going to be writing what she had no doubt would be thrilling spy stories involving the world's best-known suave British secret agent, saving the world in tuxes and fancy cars.

How could run-of-the-mill police work possibly compare or even be remotely useful to him? And it occurred to her that this truce or compromise or whatever they'd reached of his coming back even while he wrote Bond probably wasn't going to last for long. A man couldn't serve two masters, as they say, or something like that. And how much longer would One PP allow it, Castle's friendship with the Mayor notwithstanding, without the justification of research and good publicity for the NYPD? She knew not everyone was enamored of the idea of a civilian consultant and not one as well-known as Castle because if he ever got seriously injured (or worse, god forbid) while following the NYPD, it would be a publicity disaster.

He might be back for now but it was temporary.

She pushed away the thought. No sense in borrowing trouble. And she didn't know why it was so dispiriting anyway.

"So, Castle, already figuring out how you're going to write about this sort of 'thrilling excitement' in your first Bond book?" she quipped instead, making a vague gesture with her hands to indicate the act of sitting in her car watching the entrance to a run-down building. So thrilling. The only thing more thrilling would have been watching paint dry.

He laughed, tossing a grin at her. "Oh, I don't know, Beckett, I bet even being a super spy involves long hours at stakeouts just waiting for something interesting to happen. It's just that in writing a book, you get to fast forward the boring bits."

"Wow, Castle, first day back and already you're calling cop work boring," she drawled.

He sputtered a little. "Beckett, that wasn't what I meant!"

She gave in and smirked. "Settle down, Castle, I was teasing."

He made a face at her. "You think you're so funny. Anyway, if you're worried, you can still be an inspiration for the Bond books too, you know. You can be the inspiration for the Bond gi—"

She reached out to grab his earlobe. "Do not finish that sentence, Castle." On second thought, he was still annoying.

"Or not," he said meekly and she released his ear. Only for him to rally and suggest, "Moneypenny?"

She shot him a look. The secretary? "No, Castle."

"Fine, Q or M. That's not that much of a stretch. Smart savvy detective to smart, savvy secret agent."

Hmph, better. She pursed her lips in an exaggeratedly thoughtful expression. "Maybe."

He switched into his cajoling tone. "Think about it. You can be the one to tell Bond what to do."

"I hope Bond listens to instructions more often than you do."

"Well, maybe not but he's James Bond. When he goes rogue, it all works out in the end."

"Which is more than you can say for you," she teased.

He gave a loud, fake gasp of mock offense. "That is so not true!"

"Yeah, right, Cas—," she began, only to have her eye catch a flash of blond hair above a well-cut coat. She snapped to attention. Back to work. "Castle, it's her. Talbot's wife. C'mon, she's going for the mail."

Well, it wasn't Talbot's wife but his nurse.

Castle's theory that the nurse had been covering for Dr. Talbot proved to be true and in the way that happened towards the end of a case, all the pieces fell into place remarkably quickly, forming the tragic picture. Two families torn apart, lives ruined, because of one man's selfish decision. It was one of those cases she hated, the ones that left more than the usual weight on her shoulders. She couldn't help but wonder what it would be like for Zane Talbot, having lost the man he'd thought was his father, what Melissa Talbot would tell him, that his putative father had murdered his birth mother? Ugh.

She and Castle quietly left the Talbots' home after watching Teodor Hayek meet his son for the first time.

Castle was quiet, his expression pensive, as they walked down the hallway.

She nudged his arm gently with hers. "You okay?"

He blinked and looked up at her. "Yeah. Just thinking about the victim, what she must have gone through."

She sighed a little. "Yeah. I can't imagine what it must have been like, when she started to suspect."

"Bad enough to have to watch her baby die like that and then to realize she shouldn't have needed to lose her baby like that at all." He paused, his expression softening in a way she'd begun to recognize. It was his Alexis look, his expression when he was thinking or talking about his daughter. And sure enough, he started, "I remember before Alexis was born, I looked into everything I could get my hands on about babies and one of the things that kept me up at nights was worrying over her health. I still can't get over it sometimes, that she came out so perfect. Still is so perfect."

She suppressed a smile at this little aside. Castle in his father mode was impossible not to like. "You were one of those parents that freaked out every time Alexis so much as sneezed when she was little, weren't you?"

He shrugged, giving her a half-sheepish little smile. "Guilty as charged. I'm pretty sure Alexis's pediatrician got really tired of me because I used to call her practically every day. I'll never forget, this one time when Alexis was in her crawling stage and I left her alone for a minute to answer the door for the pizza guy and next thing I knew, there was a crash and one of the lights went out. I dropped the pizza and ran for Alexis, who'd started to cry. Turned out she'd crawled over to a little side table and grabbed the electrical cord for a lamp and pulled."

Kate winced. "Uh oh."

"Yeah. Thank God, the lamp didn't hit Alexis directly when it came down but one edge of the lamp shade sort of clipped Alexis's head. It didn't bleed or anything, just left a small red mark but Alexis was crying and I was freaking out until I realized after a couple minutes that my freaking out was making Alexis cry harder and I forced myself to calm down and stop scaring her."

"Oh. Poor Alexis." She could picture that, a much younger Castle falling to pieces over a crying baby Alexis. It wasn't as if Castle was given to stoicism at the best of times.

He threw her a look of mock reproach. "Poor me, you mean. Alexis was just fine. I was the one who was emotionally traumatized and I still had the pieces from the light bulb to clean up and everything." His expression shifted, his lips curving in a small reminiscent smile. "After that, you can bet I baby-proofed the loft like crazy."

"Baby-proofed it, how?"

"I taped everything down that could be taped down or tied them in place and then I bought up the city's supply of bubble wrap and basically covered the loft with it, every hard surface, every remotely sharp corner, that was anywhere close to a baby's reaching distance."

She laughed. "Bubble wrap?"

"It was all I could think of."

"The loft must have looked ridiculous."

"It did but I never wanted anything to hurt Alexis ever again. But when Meredith got home, she—"

He broke off abruptly, his expression revealing more than he probably realized with the way his face darkened. Oh, Meredith must have been upset and, judging from Castle's expression, it had led to an argument. She didn't know much about Meredith, aside from their one brief meeting (which had been quite enough), but what she knew of Meredith's general lack of involvement in Alexis's life was telling. And Castle's expression now spoke volumes. To be angry at Castle for doing something to try to keep his baby safe, even if Castle had gone overboard in typical Castle fashion.

Kate cast about for a way to change the subject, distract Castle from his memories. "So I guess your theory about the victim as a freelance investigator into the shady doctor turned out to be right," she ventured. She threw him a teasing smile. "Not bad for a crime novelist."

That got him to smile, his expression clearing. "Why, thank you, Detective, you're too kind," he returned dryly.

"I guess you can be helpful after all," she quipped.

"I'm frequently helpful!" he protested.

"Because theories about CIA conspiracies and mad scientists looking to create their own monster are so useful?" she shot back.

"My theory in this case turned out to be right, didn't it?"

"Even a stopped clock is right twice a day."

He lifted his hand to his chest in a melodramatic gesture. "I'm wounded, Detective."

"You'll survive."

He pulled an exaggerated pout (and she tried very hard not to notice the way it drew her attention to his mouth. Nope, not noticing.) "Surviving would be easier if you weren't mean to me."

She only laughed, feeling her spirits rise from the familiar exchange of banter. This was why Castle made her work more fun.

He returned her smile and for a moment that lasted a second too long, their eyes met and held as she felt that indefinable tug of… attraction that wasn't only physical but also mental, the undeniable thrill of matching wits with him. Her heart fluttered, her breathing becoming shallow—but no, she stamped down the reaction. He might be back for now but it was temporary and she didn't—couldn't let herself—get too used to him being around. Couldn't let herself like him like that.

"Beckett, I… uh—"

Something in this tone had her heart thrashing around in her chest, in spite of all her best efforts at reining it in. She felt an odd certainty that he was about to say something important.

But then—of course—because the universe just wouldn't cooperate with her or them or whatever—his phone started to ring.

He hesitated, glanced at his phone and then back at her. "It's… uh, it's my agent. I should probably…"

"You should get that," she said, her words overlapping with his.

"Right. Excuse me." He gave her a small, half-apologetic look and turned a little away from her. "Hey, Paula."

Kate found herself watching out of the corner of her eye as he spoke.

"Oh, really? That's great," he smiled and then his smile faded as Paula went on. "Mm hmm, yeah, Paula, I know. Just…" He darted a quick glance at her and Kate immediately turned, feigning absorption in studying a painting on the wall. Not that she really saw much of it. It took her a second before her eyes even focused on the painting to realize that the little dark shape she was looking at must be an animal of some sort on the depicted hillside, a horse or a cow or a goat.

As if on cue, she heard his voice in her mind commenting, _did you know that in the original Greek, tragedy literally means 'goat song'? Whatever that first story was, I can't help but think, bad things must have happened to that goat._

She felt a renegade flare of amusement and clamped her jaw shut against the bubble of laughter that threatened to escape.

She didn't know how he'd done it but he really had infiltrated her mind somehow, so just about everything seemed to remind her of him in some way, so her mind often supplied the lame pun or wisecrack he would make in response to anything.

He'd just been listening and making vague murmurs of understanding but then he said, "Send me the contract and I'll read through it…"

The contract. For Bond. He really was done with Nikki Heat. (She wasn't disappointed. Was she?)

"And actually, I wanted to know, how long do I have to think about it, before they need my answer?"

Wait. Was he… uncertain? What was there to really think about? He'd decided to write Bond, hadn't he?

"Okay. Yeah, I get it. Thanks. I'll get back to you, okay?... I know, Paula… Yeah. Keep me posted on the _Heat Wave_ numbers… Okay, thanks, bye."

She deliberately waited a moment before she glanced back at him. "Off the phone now?" she asked lamely.

"Yeah, yeah." He managed one of his usual smug smiles. "Paula called to let me know that the first day of _Heat Wave_ sales are through the roof so far."

She smiled. He looked boyishly pleased with himself. It was… cute. No, wait, no, he was not cute. She wasn't thinking about him like that. "Nice, congrats."

"Thanks."

She hesitated, debated if she dared ask him about the Bond offer, if she wanted to make it so obvious that she'd been, if not eavesdropping, listening to his half of the phone call. No, no, she couldn't ask. That would make it seem like she cared. Which she didn't. Really. She couldn't even pass it off as curiosity, what one of her favorite authors was going to write next, because that would reveal that he was one of her favorite living authors and she had no intention of telling him that. So no.

Fortunately—for once, the universe was on her side—before the silence could stretch out, her phone rang this time.

He gestured with a hand, cracking a smile. "I guess it's your turn now."

She spared him a brief smile at that before she answered. "Beckett."

And it was another case.

As she listened to Dispatch giving her the preliminary details, she met Castle's eyes and jerked her head towards the entrance before she started walking, knowing as she did so that he would be right by her side. As usual.

She ended the phone call.

"Another case?"

"How'd you guess?"

"Well, the alternative was that you felt a sudden burning urge to do paperwork and that didn't seem likely."

"Nice deducing, Castle. Maybe you're learning," she teased.

He nodded with exaggerated smugness. "I know, I'm very clever."

"And so modest too," she said dryly.

"What can I say, it's a gift."

A snort was her only comment to that piece of egotism, smothering her smile. (When had she started to find his displays of ego more amusing than annoying?)

They were in her car on the way to the next crime scene when he abruptly volunteered, "Paula was getting on my back about signing the contract for Bond."

"I didn't ask."

"No, but you heard enough to guess."

"You're going to sign, right?" she blurted out.

She sensed him dart another sidelong glance at her and schooled her expression into indifference.

He shrugged elaborately. "I haven't decided yet."

She turned to look at him, not able to help it. "Is there a reason why you wouldn't? I mean, it's James Bond. He's iconic. It'd be an instant best-seller." And, although she didn't say it, she guessed that it would mean quite a lot of money for him too. To say nothing of added publicity. It would be the apogee of any writer's career.

"Oh, well, you know, Bond is so… British."

She laughed in spite of herself. "Wow, brilliant observation there, Castle. What does that have to do with anything?"

He slid an odd sideways glance at her. "You know what they say, that the U.S. and Britain are two countries separated by a common language. I'm not up on all the British-isms, like calling the trunk of a car the boot or an eggplant an aubergine."

"Clearly that's a huge issue," she said dryly. "You expect eggplants to play a crucial role in the Bond stories?"

He puffed up in mock indignation. "Hey, don't underestimate my creativity. Sherlock Holmes once famously solved a case based on how far the parsley sank into…"

"Into the butter on a hot day," she finished for him. "I know, Castle."

He threw her a delighted look that made her cheeks heat. "You are so hot."

She tried to quell the flutter of her heart in reaction. Damn it, no, she was not reacting. "Get to the point, Castle, what does Bond being British have to do with anything?"

"Just that it's hard enough keeping details straight in any story even when you don't have to worry about British English versus American English. This one time in _Bullets and Bracelets_ , I first described a minor character as being a brunette and then at the end of the book accidentally referred to her as having blonde hair and you wouldn't believe the angry letters I got about that slip up. You'd have thought I'd committed blasphemy. And in _Gathering Storm_ , I wrote about a French diplomat and I got scads of angry letters saying that he was using American idioms and slang that no self-respecting Frenchman would use." He pulled a beleaguered face. "I feared for my life after reading some of them."

"It's tough to be you, isn't it?" she pretended to commiserate.

"I'm just saying, James Bond is famously British. He might be the most famous British fictional character ever, outside of Harry Potter, and if I make him sound too American, I'll be burned in effigy. I'd just be setting myself up to get a flood of angry letters and why would I do that? What, am I crazy?"

"Why, yes. Yes, you are," she deadpanned.

He made a face at her. "Funny, Beckett."

She threw a smirk at him. "You walked right into that one."

He couldn't be serious. She knew he wasn't serious. There were such things as editors and anyway, from what she knew of Castle, he was persistent and likely to view things like making Bond sound suitably British as a challenge to be overcome.

"Besides," he added, "a three-book deal is a big commitment. I don't know if I want to spend that much time writing about a character who always orders watered-down martinis."

She laughed again and he gave her one of his wide smirking grins when he'd said something clever but something about his expression made her breath stutter in her chest.

Was this because of… her?

Just the question had _something_ fluttering in her chest and she immediately smothered it.

No. No no no. She wasn't going to think like this, wasn't going to be such an egotist and assume that everything was about her.

He could have perfectly legitimate other reasons to hesitate before accepting the Bond offer. A three-book deal was a big commitment, as he'd said. And maybe he felt a loyalty to Black Pawn, the publishing company that had, after all, taken a risk on publishing a book by a college kid and stuck with him ever since. She didn't know; she wasn't exactly an expert on publishing but she'd followed enough of Castle's career and read enough about it to have gotten a sense of just how rare it was for a publishing company to accept a manuscript by an unknown kid in college (usually with good reasons having to do with quality). Black Pawn had taken a chance on him, a chance that had, admittedly, paid off in spades but still.

It wasn't about her. Or even about Nikki Heat.

Even his coming back to the precinct wasn't—didn't have to be—about her. He thought playing a cop was fun; he liked solving mysteries (obviously).

And besides, Castle was a multi-millionaire and she was… just a cop. He wasn't—could not be—serious about her.

She wasn't going to think like that, wasn't going to start… hoping for anything.

There was nothing—absolutely nothing—personal going on between her and Castle.

Even if he did think she was extraordinary.

Even if she did sort of like him.

More than sort of. ( _Shut up!_ )

It wasn't like that. It really wasn't. He was just her shadow, her annoying sidekick.

That was all. Really.

 _~To be continued…~_

A/N 2: All due apologies to James Bond…

Thank you, everyone, for reading. All reviews, follows, and favorites are much appreciated.


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: Something of a transitional chapter.

 **Because You Were Gone**

 _Chapter 6_

She didn't really like it, didn't want to admit it, but she felt a wayward tendril of happiness sprout up inside her when she saw Castle walking into the bullpen. She hadn't expected to see him today since it was supposed to be a paperwork day and Castle still seemed to possess his old allergy to doing paperwork. Not that he would really have been allowed to complete her paperwork for her anyway, not being a real cop, but still.

And yet, there he was, two coffees in hand.

She raised her brows at him a little as he sat down in his chair. (When had the battered old chair beside her desk turned into _his_ chair?) "Hey, Castle."

"Ask me why I'm here."

"Isn't that obvious? It's to annoy me."

The snarky response was automatic but then something flickered across his eyes and she felt a sudden pang of guilt. He wasn't that bad and she hadn't meant to hurt him. (She was so bad at this, this feeling vulnerable thing.)

But then he regrouped and managed a small smile. "No, that's just an unintended consequence. Try again."

"My correct use of irony?" she quipped.

That got him to laugh. "As much as I appreciate your correct use of irony, that is actually not what brings me here today."

"Okay, fine, why are you here, aside from distracting me from my paperwork?"

"You can thank me for the distraction later," he responded breezily. She sternly hid a smile, made easier by the fact that his expression shifted, became more serious and more uncertain. "Actually, I wanted to check with you about something."

He paused and she gave him an expectant look. "Well, what is it?"

He hesitated, glanced toward Captain Montgomery's office where Montgomery was on the phone, and then back at her. "Black Pawn wants me to write three more Nikki Heats," he finished in a rush.

Her breath fractured in her chest. Three more Nikki Heats. That would take years…

"But—but what about Bond? I assumed…"

He shrugged with elaborate casualness. "I turned down the Bond offer."

Wait. He had—what?

She stared at him and tried—oh, she really tried—to smother the stupid, unreasoning flare of something like happiness (like hope).

And yet…

She heard his voice in her head. _I'm pretty sure I could write 50 books about the character and still not have explored the character fully._

He'd turned down Bond. He wanted to write more Nikki Heat.

Oh. Oh god.

He had _turned down_ the offer to write Bond.

What had she thought at his party? That only an idiot or a lunatic would turn down the offer to write Bond.

Castle wasn't an idiot. And whatever she might say, he wasn't crazy.

Writing James Bond would have meant money (lots of it, she had no doubt) and fame and publicity.

And he had turned it down.

Because… he wanted to write about another character. Because… he wanted (cared more about) something else...

Unbidden, she suddenly found herself thinking about Will. Will, who had left her for a promotion and a raise in Boston. Not without some expressions of regret, true, but there had also never been even an instant when he'd considered not going. (And obviously, her going to Boston with him had been a non-starter from the beginning too.)

She could tell herself—and she did—that it was different, not a fair comparison. Will had been—was—younger than Castle and he had his own career to establish and the chance to head up a FBI major crimes team in Boston wasn't something to be given up lightly. She of all people understood what it was to have to work your way up the ranks in law enforcement. Whereas Castle was already rich, already famous.

And yet…

Kate was a cop, a realist, not to say a cynic. All she'd seen had told her that there was no such thing as being too rich, not really. Rich people wanted to stay rich and get richer. The whole financial crash, the Lehman brothers' thing, all she saw in her job every day, told her that the human instinct of greed was insatiable. It was like trying to fill a bucket that had a hole in the bottom—it was impossible.

But Castle had turned down Bond. The chance for more money and more fame.

And now she really couldn't help the tiny, insidious voice whispering, _was this for me?_

Because here he was, writing more Nikki Heat.

If anyone had told her months ago that she would react like this, feel a flock of happy butterflies in her stomach, at the thought of Castle wanting to write another book about her, she'd have scoffed and sent them off for a psych eval for clearly being absolutely insane.

But now… well, now, she knew what it was like to work without him (less fun), knew the way he viewed her (extraordinary), the way he'd written an entire book as a compliment to her (love letter to her, Lanie's voice in her mind commented)... Now, she knew she would miss him if (when?) he left.

"Three more Nikki Heats?" she repeated.

"Yeah. And, uh, the Mayor really liked _Heat Wave_ , the authenticity of it…" He glanced over to Montgomery's office again and she realized what Montgomery's phone call likely was. A request for cooperation from the Mayor or someone at One PP.

What Castle was getting at, even if he wasn't outright saying it. He was going to be staying. For research, she told herself sternly. For three more books (at least), which meant… years. He was going to be staying.

She controlled her expression, the smile she felt wanting to break free. "Of course," she said with studied cool, "I'm happy to help the Mayor out in any way that I can."

He looked at her, a small, tentative smile playing around his lips. "It's good publicity for the NYPD," he offered.

"Yes," was her forcibly tepid contribution. Because grinning like a loon was out of the question.

"And you know, I'd hate to write about outdated procedures."

She quelled a bubble of giddy laughter. "No, that would be terrible," she agreed with manufactured calm, even as warmth settled in her chest.

Because she knew—and he knew—that he didn't need to do more research. By now, he knew enough about police procedures and the ins and outs of homicide work to write the 50 books he'd said he could write about Nikki Heat. And authenticity and good publicity for the NYPD were all well and good but he didn't need to do this, keep shadowing her. The Mayor could request it but if Castle didn't want to do it, then he didn't have to. No, Castle was staying because he wanted to, because he... liked spending time with her.

Oh god. How could she possibly not soften towards him, not feel warmth blossoming in her chest? It was so… flattering.

She would never have thought she'd be so susceptible to flattery but this was… different. She'd probably have to be dead to be immune from feeling a little pleasure—and more—at the idea that a charming, handsome, intelligent man found her to be so… interesting.

God, had anyone ever done anything remotely like this for her? Even as she wondered, she knew the answer. No. No one had ever made such a gesture for her.

How could she not like him?

She paused, fighting back a blush, and then went on blandly, "So I guess… I'll need to put up with you for awhile longer."

"I guess so."

"I must have done something pretty terrible in a past life to be stuck with you."

But he—irritating, smug man that he was—only grinned at her, entirely unfazed, and she felt an answering smile break free, giving away the tease in her words.

"Or something really great," he corrected. "I'm helpful and we make a good team, remember?"

Yeah, they did make a good team. And she kind of liked having him on her team. Liked having him by her side.

She just… liked him. Oh, shit.

She didn't do this, didn't let herself care about people or get too close. He'd already wormed his way into her life and hurt her once. (But he'd apologized for that.)

"Oh, I'm just letting you stay for the coffee," she managed to quip, giving him a mock toast with the coffee he'd brought her.

He clapped a hand to his chest in histrionic dismay. "Using me for my coffee? I'm wounded."

She flicked a deliberate glance up and down his body. "You look just fine to me," she drawled.

He choked on air and fell into a coughing fit and she repented the impulse to tease—no, flirt, the word was flirt—like that. She shouldn't. She really shouldn't. It was… dangerous.

He was still… well, him, rich and famous and all that. And she was still just a cop. They were too different, lived too different lives to make anything work.

But he… liked her. Agreeing to spend years in a precinct to do "research" for books based on her just to spend time with her—he had to like her.

Oh god…

Now what?

But then before she could feel more than a flicker of panic, they were both distracted as her phone rang and Castle himself was hailed a few seconds later by LT and any opportunity for them to talk more was lost.

Not that she had any idea what else she would say. Not that there really was anything else to say. Because she didn't—wouldn't—like him like that. She couldn't. She wouldn't. Really.

And one of these days, that might even be true.

* * *

Castle put his copy of the new Nikki Heat contract away in his files and then paused, pulling out instead the copy of the James Bond contract. The contract he had turned down. (But was still keeping, if only for the ego boost. The reminder that he, Richard Castle, had really made it so that he'd been chosen to continue the Bond series. He, not Patterson, not Cannell, not Connelly. He might have to leave the contract "accidentally" lying out in view for their next poker night.)

There were times it seemed as if the row of Ian Fleming's Bond novels were figuratively gaping at him from his shelf, part of him still incredulous at what he'd done. He, the man who'd loved James Bond and basically idolized Ian Fleming since boyhood, turning down a lucrative offer to continue his idol's series.

Yeah, put like that, he might have lost his mind.

But no, it wasn't his mind that he'd lost at all, just his heart.

Because he had. Totally and completely. He'd given up on pretending that he wasn't entirely in love with Beckett.

And that was the reason. Every time he even so much as thought about the Bond offer, all he needed to do was conjure up the image of her face—her gorgeous green-gold eyes, her perfect features, every one of her smiles. No, more than that, all he needed to do was just think about Beckett (which was basically always, anyway) and he knew that Bond could never hold a candle to Beckett. He couldn't walk away from Beckett, from the persistent hope of what he and Beckett could be together.

Anyway, Bond as a character couldn't hold a candle to Nikki Heat.

Bond was too much like Derrick Storm. Or rather, Derrick Storm was too much like Bond. And Castle knew what that meant in a character. Knew what it would be like to write a character like that.

It would be cool and fun and exciting at first. But it would get old, just as writing Derrick Storm had. Admittedly, it would most likely take more than the three books he'd been offered to write about Bond; he'd written ten books about Derrick Storm before he'd really given up on Storm. But still, having created Nikki Heat, he wasn't ready to walk away from her.

Nikki Heat was different. She was flawed, real, vulnerable and strong, compassionate and stubborn, defensive and driven, clever but not omniscient. Or at least, she would be all those things if he could only write her well enough to do Beckett justice. And oh, he wanted to try. Writing Nikki Heat well was a challenge, one he could never tire of.

Just as he already knew that Kate Beckett was the most challenging, frustrating, remarkable person he'd ever met and he would never, ever, get enough of her. (Not to mention that she was so gorgeous, so effortlessly sexy, that it seemed like a near-constant surprise, the way even now she made him forget how to breathe just from looking at her.)

"Dad."

He looked up at Alexis's voice. "Yeah, Alexis?"

"Dinner's ready."

"Be there in a sec."

She had been leaning in the doorway of his office but she made the rest of the way in, coming around his desk to join him. "Is that the Nikki Heat contract?"

"Bond, actually."

A faint frown flickered across her face. "Are you… changing your mind? Dad, you said you signed…"

"No, no," he reassured quickly, putting the contract back and closing the drawer firmly. "I'm not changing my mind. I was just putting it away. I'm writing Nikki Heat; I signed the contract yesterday and it was delivered today. That's all set."

"No second thoughts then?"

"None," he assured her firmly and honestly. He would never be ready to walk away from Beckett, never wanted to walk away from her.

"Good. You've said yourself that you try never to break a contract, that you couldn't get rid of Derrick Storm until you'd finished the contract even if you wanted to."

"And I meant it. I keep my promises."

He did. He didn't make many promises for that very reason but he always tried to keep them. If for no other reason than because he'd seen too much of what Meredith's long string of broken promises did to Alexis and had resolved that he would never do that.

Alexis smiled and tucked herself against his side in one of her affectionate gestures. "I know you do, Dad. Oh, did you talk to Detective Beckett today about writing more Nikki Heat?"

He put his arm around her shoulders, resting his chin on her hair for a moment. "I did."

"And what'd she say?"

"She's fine with it."

"Fine with it because the Mayor wants it and she has no choice or really fine with it?"

His clever girl sounded so worldly-wise. She was growing up too fast.

"Really fine with it. I think she's even a little pleased that there'll be more Nikki Heats." He felt a smile curving his lips at the thought.

Alexis drew back to give him a skeptical look that Beckett herself could not have bettered. "Pleased, Dad, really? Or is that just you being, well, you?"

He gave her a look of feigned outrage. "Just what is that supposed to mean, daughter of mine?"

Alexis pursed her lips into one of innocence but her dancing eyes gave her away. She was mocking him. His own daughter was mocking him. "Nothing, Dad, just that you can be a little vain."

"Vain!" he bridled in exaggerated offense. "I am not vain. I'm the most humble man you'll ever meet."

"Sure, Dad, you're as 'umble as Uriah Heep."

He gave in and laughed, pretending to catch Alexis in a head-lock. "A fitting Dickens reference. You will go far, my young apprentice."

Alexis squirmed out from under his arm with a well-placed poke in his side. "Dad!" And for just a moment, she might have been his little girl again, the one he could hoist up onto his back for piggyback rides, the one he'd played tickle monster with until even his sometimes too-serious little girl had shrieked with laughter.

He shoved aside the flicker of wistfulness at the memories—she was still his little girl. "And to answer your question, oh skeptical one, I think she really is pleased. Of course she joked about only keeping me around for the coffee..." But she'd smiled at him, one of her real, bright smiles that put sparks in her eyes, illuminated her entire expression like the dawning of a new day ( _oh, that's just sickening, Rick_ ). She hadn't said much, not really, but it wasn't Beckett's way. Her way was to tease; it was part of their habitual banter and he loved her sardonic wit.

But she was smart enough to know that he didn't really need to spend all his days in the precinct in order to write Nikki Heat; it wasn't as if he hadn't written quite a few books before he'd met her. And even the months he'd spent shadowing Sophia and learning about the CIA hadn't involved as much of a time commitment as the precinct did (partly because Alexis had been younger and had needed more of his time and attention then).

No, he was sure she could guess that research was essentially an excuse to spend time with her. It wasn't about the books anymore. (For that matter, he wasn't sure how much it had ever really been about the books.)

Oh, he valued the work at the precinct for its own sake and he really did enjoy the camaraderie he'd found with the boys and some of the others in the precinct but it was mostly about Beckett. She hadn't said as much; they had both been carefully skirting around the subtext. But as formidable as her poker face was, he was learning to read her better and he'd realized that however well she could control her expressions, her eyes often gave her away. And her eyes had been bright, even—dare he say it—happy at the news that he would be writing more Nikki Heat, that he would be sticking around.

So yeah, Castle was hopeful.

"Good, I'm glad." Alexis paused and then added, a little more tentatively, "You really like her, don't you, Dad?"

He studied Alexis sharply at the question, wondering, a little nervous. She seemed serene enough but either way, he slid his arm around her shoulders as he answered, cautiously, "Yeah, I do."

Alexis gave him a small smile. "I like her too. She's different from the women who come up to you at your parties." Mischief abruptly glinted in her eyes. "Besides, I like anyone who can help keep you out of trouble."

"I do not get into trouble!" he huffed in automatic (and not quite truthful) protest.

Alexis rolled her eyes rather like Beckett did. "Sure you don't, Mr. I-Stole-A-Police-Horse."

"That was one time and it was years ago!" Note to self: do better about censoring his stories to Alexis. She was clever enough on her own; he didn't need to be giving her ammunition against him.

Alexis laughed. "Maybe but Beckett also had to arrest you for stealing evidence."

"I was _trying_ to prevent an innocent man from being wrongfully convicted of murder."

"I know, Dad."

He pulled a face at her. "You should be nicer to your own father."

Alexis only smirked. "I just know you too well." She sobered. "And Dad, since you really do like her, maybe you shouldn't be all 'I'm Richard Castle' when she's around." She pitched her voice into a very bad imitation of a male voice on the words, 'I'm Richard Castle.'

He laughed. "What does that mean? I'm always Richard Castle since it is my name." He pulled a deliberately silly face for her benefit.

"I mean, don't act the way you do at your parties. Just be you, Dad." She paused and then added with a smirk, "You're not that bad when you're being just you."

He snorted in spite of himself. "Thank you, daughter. You're too kind," he said dryly. And Alexis did have a point. He had already decided to show more of his real self with Beckett, drop the playboy act, as frightening as the thought was. He hadn't realized how much the act had been a defense mechanism, hiding behind the persona, until he'd decided to drop it. But Beckett herself was real, if guarded, and if he wanted her to trust him again (and he did), he needed to trust her more too. Trust went both ways. And sincerity was what had made her forgive him and let him come back to the precinct in the first place.

She only laughed and tugged on his arm. "You know what I mean. Come on, Dad, it's dinner time."

He made a show of being pulled along just to make her laugh and for the moment, decided that he didn't need anything else. He had his daughter (and his mother) and Beckett had forgiven him, let him come back to the precinct. And he could swear she really was at least a little happy to have him back, liked having him around. It wasn't all he wanted from Beckett—he wanted everything with her—but for now, it was enough. He could wait. He would do better, prove himself to Beckett, earn her trust (again). And then, well, he would see.

 _~To be continued…~_

A/N 2: One more chapter to go…


	7. Chapter 7

Author's Note: The last chapter, which is a post-ep for 2x10, "One Man's Treasure."

 **Because You Were Gone**

 _Chapter 7_

Castle was watching Alexis and Kate was watching Castle. Secretly. She was ostensibly doing the paperwork to finish up the Sam Parker case but out of the corner of her eye, she was watching Castle watch Alexis.

A quick glance told her that Alexis was still talking to Anna Knowles, looking through the album, both of them smiling, even if the smiles were tinged with melancholy on both sides. And Castle had the Alexis look on his face, his eyes looking very soft and very blue, a barely-there tender smile just tipping up the corners of his lips.

And the look had her heart softening, fluttering, in that way that was becoming annoyingly frequent where Castle was concerned.

It really was impossible not to like Castle in his father mode. And not just in his father mode either.

Damn it, she didn't want to like him. Didn't even want to admit that she might but it was getting harder and harder to deny that she did. Damn it.

Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed that Anna Knowles was leaving, after giving Alexis a quick hug. Castle got up and joined Alexis, who tucked herself against his side, as he put his arm around her shoulders.

And she couldn't help but notice how tall and broad he looked, especially when compared to Alexis. She felt a little jolt of desire wriggle through her. His chest and his shoulders filled out his jacket nicely and not for the first time, she found herself wondering what it would be like to feel his strength against her, over her.

Damn it, no! She wasn't—should not be thinking like this about Castle. Not in the middle of the bullpen. Or anywhere else for that matter.

Work. She was at work. She dragged her eyes down to her paperwork but her attempt at concentration didn't last long as she caught the sound of Alexis laughing and her disobedient eyes flickered back to look at Castle and Alexis.

Castle tugged lightly on a lock of Alexis's hair as he said something that made Alexis smile.

And Kate felt her heart pinch. Her mom had done that too. She remembered her mom teasingly tweaking her hair in one of her habitual gestures of affection. She remembered too times she had ducked her head to try to avoid the gesture, even brushing her mom's hand aside, in her bratty teen phase of being too cool and too grown up for such displays of affection from her own mom.

Her mom would have liked Castle. Not only because she'd liked his books but just as a person too. Her mom would have appreciated his sense of humor, his wit, and his intelligence. She would have liked the way he cared about his family.

The back of her eyes prickled and Kate became belatedly aware that she really had no business to be watching this relatively private father-daughter moment and forcibly tugged her gaze away to refocus on her paperwork, trying to get her emotions under control. She was fine, really. It was silly to get so worked up over something as minor as a tug on a lock of hair.

But then again, it wasn't so minor. As she'd just said to Alexis, when someone loses someone, this sort of thing was important. Photos, memories, the reminders of people you had lost. She of all people knew that. She kept an old family photo in her own wallet just because her mom had had it in hers when she was killed.

And somehow, Alexis had instinctively understood that too, making such an effort to find Anna Knowles, not even giving up when none of her inquiries with current detectives had panned out.

 _A chip off the old block._ It was in line with Castle's usual displays of ego but, well, Kate had to admit that he wasn't wrong either. She thought about the way Castle had empathized with Jenna McBoyd's situation, the way he'd stepped in to make sure that Rina, at least, wasn't left so friendless and unprotected.

Damn it, he wasn't supposed to be so likeable. Where was the annoying, immature jackass when she needed him? She felt irrationally irritated with Castle for proving that he wasn't really the playboy jerk who just wanted to get into her pants and didn't take anything seriously.

And now he was distracting her from her work too. Ugh. It might be paperwork that she didn't exactly find riveting at the best of times but still.

She made a face at his chair and forcibly pushed any more wandering thoughts of Castle out of her mind.

But of course, her concentration was broken, again, before too long as Castle returned to her desk with Alexis in tow.

She looked up, carefully focusing on Alexis and not her perennial distraction. "So, was Anna Knowles happy to get the pictures?"

Alexis beamed. "Yeah. She was really sweet, kept on thanking me, even though I told her she didn't need to."

"You did a good thing, Alexis," Kate assured the girl. "These things matter; they're important."

Alexis thanked her with a bright smile.

"Beckett, we were wondering if you'd want to get dinner with us," Castle interjected.

She blinked. Dinner? With Castle and his daughter? She shouldn't. Spending more time with Castle outside of work wasn't in her plans. Made it too easy for him to soften her up yet further. "Well, I… haven't finished my paperwork," she began lamely, latching onto the first excuse she could think of.

"We can wait. Please come, Detective," Alexis chimed in. "Dad says we need to celebrate me solving the Mystery of the Unclaimed Photos and I couldn't have done it without you."

She could hear the capital letters in Alexis's tone. Yeah, the girl was definitely a Castle, had the same way of making everyday things sound dramatic. And of course Castle would say they needed to celebrate. He liked excuses to celebrate. And not just widely known geek holidays such as Pi Day and Star Wars Day either. He'd brought in chocolate-covered raisins for National Chocolate Covered Raisin Day, and chocolate cupcakes for National Chocolate Cupcake Day, and cookies in the shape of ravens to commemorate the anniversary of Edgar Allan Poe's death. It was silly and part of his being a font of (mostly) useless trivia but it was also surprisingly… endearing. He made things fun.

"You should come, Beckett," Castle added. Because of course he would. "We solved our case too so we should celebrate. It's tradition."

She raised her eyebrows at him. "A tradition—which we've never done before?"

He had the grace to look a little sheepish but it was immediately replaced by his cajoling expression. That was kind of ador—no, no, she wasn't thinking that. "We could start a tradition?"

She snorted and Alexis poked Castle in the side.

"Dad, don't be silly."

Castle sobered (sort of). "Seriously, Beckett, join us for dinner. Please?"

A refusal formed in her throat and she opened her lips and found herself saying, "Yes, fine." Wait, what?

It was his eyes, she decided disgruntledly. His eyes and his smile and his saying 'please' and his way of looking at her as if she was amazing and his entire day hung on her answer and just… _him_. He really was charming, had a way of slipping past her defenses.

"That is, if you don't mind waiting a little while so I can finish up this paperwork," she added hurriedly.

"We can wait," Castle agreed promptly.

"We don't mind waiting," Alexis answered, her words overlapping with his.

A smile escaped her in spite of herself and was reflected back in his own smile and in the brightness of his eyes. Okay, so she wasn't sorry that her mouth had disobeyed the instructions of her brain and accepted the invitation to dinner as opposed to refusing it.

Anyway, she counseled herself, it didn't mean anything. Not really. It was approaching dinner time and Alexis would be there so it wasn't like it would just be her and Castle. It would be like going out for drinks with Espo and Ryan. It was just a purely friendly dinner with a work colleague and his kid. Really.

( _Sure, Kate, keep telling yourself that._ )

It took nearly an hour for her to finish up the paperwork but for once, Castle did seem quite happy to wait, not even driving her crazy with fidgeting or random trivia questions or anything. Of course, it helped that Alexis was there too so he and Alexis spent most of the time chatting with the boys and then with LT and Karpowski.

But even though Castle appeared to be engrossed in his various conversations, she realized that he wasn't as he immediately looked over at her the moment she closed the file for the Sam Parker case and shut down her computer. He excused himself and sidled over to her. "Done with your paperwork, Beckett?"

How was he always so aware of her? And he looked so… like a little boy, anticipation curling his lips upwards, his blue eyes bright. Her heart skipped inside her chest in spite of herself. He just looked so… happy at the prospect of spending more time with her.

It could just be that he was hungry and wanted his dinner, she told herself repressively, but somehow the dampening words carried no weight.

"Yes, for now," she answered. "Just let me turn it in and then we can head out."

He all but bounced on his feet. Ridiculous adorable man. No, not adorable, just ridiculous. She bit back a grimace. Yeah, she wasn't even convincing herself anymore.

She submitted the paperwork while Castle collected Alexis and then they were leaving the precinct together, Castle hailing a cab for them before she could say a word of demurral. She felt a lick of belated nervousness as they slid into the cab and Castle quickly gave an address to the cab driver. It hadn't occurred to her but she had no idea what sort of restaurant Castle had in mind. She'd seen enough publicity mentions of him in Page Six at exclusive restaurants like Le Cirque and Jean Georges to suddenly wonder. Alexis looked nice enough, as did he (he always dressed well), but she was still in her utilitarian work clothes. And he was a multi-millionaire; he could eat at places that cost upwards of $100 a plate every day and not have it make a dent in his net worth.

But before she could feel more than a flicker of apprehension, the cab was slowing to a stop and Castle had opened the door for Alexis and then herself to slide out. Too late now. But if she had to break the bank to pay for her dinner tonight, it would be proof that she really had no business in Castle's world.

Alexis led the way, all but skipping into a small, rather nondescript restaurant called simply DeAngelo's. That was somewhat reassuring.

"I think Alexis is excited for dinner," she observed mildly.

He smiled. "Yeah, she likes this place. We've been coming here for years and the owners are friends of ours."

She tried not to notice the warmth of his hand fleetingly touching her back as if to guide her and tried even more not to miss it when his hand dropped from her back.

The moment they stepped inside DeAngelo's, she found herself relaxing. The place was… cozy was the best word for it. A small, homey sort of place with pictures of what must be the Italian countryside on the walls. She liked it immediately. And somewhere inside her, she felt another chip of her resistance to Castle crumble. He might be a multi-millionaire but he was down-to-earth, _real_ too.

True to Castle's word, he and Alexis were greeted as old friends by the maître d' and by the owners of the restaurant, a middle-aged couple who bustled out of the kitchen to welcome them and exclaim over Alexis.

Unsurprisingly, too, all the food proved to be delicious.

Castle was probably the least talkative she'd ever seen him as he mostly listened to Alexis telling stories from her week at the precinct and asked the girl the details on how she solved the Mystery of the Unclaimed Photos. (The capital letters were even more evident in Castle's tone. He made it sound like the biggest mystery since the theft at the Gardner Museum in Boston.)

Alexis smiled at him. "Well, you gave me the idea to start looking into the detectives who had retired. I had to ask Detectives Esposito and Ryan for some help in getting me the contact information for those detectives, when they weren't busy with their real work for you, of course," Alexis added in hurried reassurance.

Kate smiled at the girl. "That's all right, Alexis. I wasn't worried about that." The boys knew better than that, even if she hadn't known about their involvement, but it was sweet of Alexis to mention.

"It turned out there were six detectives who had retired or had been transferred to a different precinct who might have worked on the case and so I started calling around. I felt a little bad to bother them at home over something like this," Alexis admitted.

"That's never stopped your dad before," Kate quipped mildly, directing a smirk at Castle.

He, of course, reacted with predictable drama.

Alexis snickered. "She's right, Dad."

He made a face at her.

"Anyway," Alexis continued, sobering, "luckily, Detective Radovich, who turned out to be the one who worked on Anna's mom's case, was only the second one that I called so I didn't need to call the entire list. He was really nice about it too, agreeing to come into the precinct and meet me so he could look at the pictures and see if he recognized the people, and of course he did."

"That was some nice detective work, Alexis," Kate praised sincerely.

"Yes, good job being persistent, pumpkin," Castle chimed in. "It would have been easy to give up when your leads with the current cops ran out but you didn't."

Alexis shrugged off the praise. "I just felt like it was important. Family photos are important. Besides," she added with a smirk that was reminiscent of her father's, "it was more interesting than cataloguing the other unclaimed property." Definitely her father's daughter, to deflect like that. She abruptly looked stricken, making an apologetic face. "I mean, not that I minded the cataloguing either," she hastily added. "I know it's just as important to free up the real cops so they can do the real, hard jobs."

Kate laughed easily. "That's okay, Alexis. I know cataloguing isn't the most exciting job in the world. I'm glad you found something more interesting to do to give you a break from it and what you did was important. I'm sure Anna Knowles agrees."

Alexis relaxed, smiling. "I really did enjoy myself. All the cops I talked to were nice to me and it was so interesting to learn more about what cops really do."

Castle huffed in feigned offense. "You haven't learned enough about cop work from my stories about the precinct?"

Alexis shot him a smirk. "I've learned not to trust all your stories, Dad. You like to exaggerate too much or make things up to make them more interesting."

Kate grinned as Castle pretended to bridle. "She's got you there, Castle."

"It's mean for both of you to gang up on me," he pouted.

Alexis reached over to pat his hand with deliberate condescension. "I'm sure you'll survive, Dad."

He made a face at Alexis and Kate snickered. And for once, couldn't muster up even a little annoyance as yet another piece of her resistance to Castle seemed to flake away. She was too relaxed, too… content right now, replete with good food and good company, as if the warmth and affection inherent in all of Castle and Alexis's interactions had wrapped around her like a blanket.

Alexis sobered. "Cops do have really hard jobs, don't they, Detective?"

"It can be hard," Kate agreed cautiously. "But it's not all bad."

"It's just… when I called Anna to ask her to come into the precinct, I introduced myself as calling from the precinct and she just… she was upset at first, afraid I was calling with bad news."

Oh. Kate stilled, feeling a little chill settle inside her, the warmth she'd been basking in receding, at the memories. Returning home with her dad that cold January night to find Detective Raglan at their door, that moment when he'd first said, _I'm very sorry to tell you this…_ She inwardly flinched and shuddered away from the memory, the worst day of her life. She thought she'd managed to hide it but her eyes caught Castle's gaze on her, his eyes so soft and filled with concern for her, and she realized that he'd immediately guessed or just known how she would react. And she normally hated pity but from Castle, well, it wasn't pity. It was warmer than that, deeper. Understanding, perhaps, empathy, and maybe some other emotions she didn't dare ascribe to him. But she felt somehow comforted anyway.

"I reassured her of course," Alexis continued, "told her it was nothing bad, just that I had some pictures that belonged to her mom to return to her, but it got me thinking about what you do, Detective, and when you talk to people, you really do have to give them bad news pretty much all the time. How do you do it?"

"Very carefully," Kate answered without the slightest intention of being funny. And for maybe the first time in his life, Castle didn't appear to notice any unintentional humor either. She paused, glanced at Castle to confirm that he was watching her, his eyes and expression entirely devoid of any of his usual amusement, and then returned her eyes to Alexis. "It is hard," she admitted slowly, trying to decide how much to reveal, how candid to be with the girl. But Alexis had been serious in her question, showed only appropriately solemn interest. And Kate couldn't say, after witnessing Alexis with Anna Knowles, that the girl wasn't mature enough to know at least some of it. "It's hard both because you're having to give people the worst news a person can get but also because as a cop, we have to balance compassion with the need to get information about the victim. Honesty helps, as does sincerity," she finally finished.

"Does it… does it ever get easier?" Alexis asked quietly.

"No, it doesn't," Kate responded gently but frankly.

"Beckett is good at it," Castle added softly, ostensibly addressing Alexis, but his gaze was on Kate as she swivelled her eyes to him in some surprise. "Captain Montgomery says she's the best at it that he's ever seen."

Oh. Montgomery said that? But even as she tried to focus on Montgomery's praise, she knew that it wasn't her captain's words that had her cheeks flushing, her stomach fluttering. No, that was all about Castle, about the look in his eyes, the tone of his voice. ( _The extraordinary KB…_ )

"I don't know how you do it, Detective," Alexis said, something like awe tingeing her tone and making her sound younger than her years, in spite of the maturity reflected in her understanding.

"I only do what I have to for my job," Kate responded. She was hardly some sort of super-hero.

"Still. Your job's a hard one and Dad likes to say that a job done well is something to respect."

"Oh, does he?" Kate murmured meaninglessly, glancing at Castle.

He lifted his shoulders into a small shrug. "I have my moments." The words and the gesture might at any other time been flippant but that was belied by his tone.

"Yeah, I guess you do," she admitted quietly, her eyes meeting and holding his. And she couldn't deny the warmth pooling in her chest, coiling around her heart. She just… liked him.

A lot. (Oh god.)

She jerked her eyes away from him and busied herself by taking a sip of her water, using her fork to mindlessly move some of her meal's detritus around on her plate.

At that inopportune moment, Alexis got up, excusing herself to go to the bathroom, leaving Kate excruciatingly conscious that she was now alone with Castle for all intents and purposes since none of the other diners was paying the least bit of attention to them.

She resisted the stupid and revelatory impulse to flee after Alexis and instead decided to change the subject to something a little safer. "She's a good kid." There, Alexis should be a safe subject.

His expression softened as he glanced towards where Alexis had gone. "Yeah, I lucked out with her."

Damn, she'd forgotten how… utterly likable Castle was when he wore his Alexis expression, spoke in that soft voice. But she forged doggedly on. "She impressed people at the precinct. A couple people commented on how polite and friendly she is, and how helpful. Even Greenwald said something about it," she added, referring to a cop who was rather notorious for his curmudgeonly demeanor and his well-known belief that no one under the age of 25 was of any use. But Alexis had won Greenwald over. He'd commented, gruffly, as of someone making a huge concession, that Alexis wasn't as annoying as other teenagers were. But coming from Greenwald, that was the equivalent of enthusiastic praise.

Castle smiled, puffing up a little with pride. It was adorable. (Damn it, she needed to stop thinking this way about him.) "She is pretty great. Sometimes I can't believe she's mine."

She raised her eyebrows at him. "So much for her being a chip off the old block," she teased.

He only grinned. "Touché, Detective. I think I spend most of my time being amazed at Alexis. What can I say," he shrugged but the nonchalant gesture was utterly contradicted by the sincerity of his expression as he finished, "being Alexis's dad is the best thing I've ever done."

He glanced at something behind her and his expression smoothed out into a more usual smirk. "I hope you left some room for dessert, Beckett, because the tiramisu here is a masterpiece and I know how much you like coffee."

She wasn't surprised when Alexis slid back into her seat midway through Castle's words, going along with his change of subject. "A masterpiece, huh? That's quite a claim and what if I told you I only like coffee in liquid form and not as a dessert?"

He feigned shock as if she'd just announced that she hated puppies. "Beckett, how can you not like coffee as a dessert?"

She gave an elaborate shrug. "It's possible." Possible but not true. She loved tiramisu too.

He studied her for a moment and then declared, "Nope, you're just having me on, aren't you, Beckett?"

Damn. How did he read her so well? So much for her vaunted poker face. But in spite of herself, she couldn't help but laugh. "How'd you guess, Castle?"

"I've seen how much you love your coffee, Beckett. It's a physical impossibility for anyone who loves coffee as much as you do not to like coffee-flavored dessert and I know you have a sweet tooth too."

He wasn't wrong. "Nice deducing, Castle," she teased.

He looked ridiculously pleased with himself. "I work with cops."

"Oh, you do, huh?" she retorted dryly. "I think that sounds familiar."

He snickered. "I thought it might."

Silly man.

The sound of Alexis's pealing giggle had Kate glancing at her, recalled to her presence. Oops. The girl's smile was pleased and oddly knowing. Kate felt herself flush. Okay, note to self, not so much banter since it tended to edge too close to flirting where Castle was concerned.

Thankfully, though, there was a brief interruption as the server came by and Castle placed an order for tiramisu for each of them, while Alexis ordered gelato.

Kate deliberately turned her attention to Alexis, asking about the cataloguing Alexis had done in the precinct as the first topic her mind could latch onto. Alexis answered easily and her light commentary carried them through until the tiramisu arrived.

And it really was delicious. Kate closed her eyes in bliss at the first bite. Mmm, god, that was amazing.

She opened her eyes to see that Castle was watching her, his mouth slightly parted, his eyes abruptly dark. Oh, wait, that little sound had been from her, hadn't it?

She swallowed, feeling heat singe her cheeks. "It really is good," she finally said lamely.

He blinked and then his lips quirked into the faintest smile. "I could tell." He blinked and then abruptly glanced to Alexis. "You dig in, pumpkin."

Alexis dug in and the moment passed as they all started to eat but Kate couldn't quite return to her former ease, her body too aware of him, or maybe more accurately, her reaction to him.

The first time her ankle brushed against his, she almost startled, twitching her leg away, her gaze flying to his to see that he looked almost as surprised as she felt. Oh, so he hadn't shifted intentionally.

The second time her ankle brushed his, she again twitched her leg away, glancing up at him only to find her eyes ensnared by the sight of his lips closing around his fork. But she thought she detected a faint species of tension in his form. He wasn't as indifferent to these inadvertent touches as he was trying to seem. He licked a last dollop of cream off his fork and she felt her entire body go up in a wash of heat. Oh shit.

The third time her ankle brushed his, she gave up. This was getting ridiculous and it was just an innocent touch and not even of skin since the touch was through both of their respective pants and socks. It was nothing. So she told herself and tried not to notice the way she swore she could feel the heat of his skin even through the layers of material. It wasn't like they were playing footsie, she told herself. Neither of them was moving a muscle, it was just their ankles brushing against each other. It was nothing, she told herself again.

But then he glanced up at her, his gaze getting tangled with hers, and she froze, felt oddly pinned by his eyes. Her mouth went dry, her throat closing on the bite of tiramisu she'd just taken. Her lungs forgot how to work, her breathing stuttering. She… um… he… he really wanted her, she thought fuzzily. She'd known that—hadn't she?—but this wasn't about lust. Or it was but it wasn't only lust. He didn't want just one night with her. He'd… turned down the offer to write Bond and agreed to write three more books about Nikki Heat to spend time with her.

If it was just lust, it would have been easier. She knew how to deal with lust. But what she saw in his eyes now was more than just lust; it was deeper than that, warmer than that. It was… a little exhilarating and a lot terrifying and… how the hell was this even _happening_ , that Richard Castle of all people was looking at her like this and she had the very bad feeling that she was looking right back at him in much the same way?

Oh shit.

She forcibly returned her eyes to her plate, pretending absorption in the tiramisu that she could barely taste anymore, all her attention elsewhere.

She sensed rather than saw him take a drink of water and then heard his voice as he asked Alexis a question about some friend of Alexis's.

Alexis answered freely and thankfully, Alexis's blithe recounting of some of the latest high school drama carried them through the rest of dessert, paying the bill (which Castle flatly refused to allow her to so much as look at and Kate gave in after a brief argument and Alexis too chimed in on Castle's side) and the cab ride back, Castle directing the cab to her place.

Again, Castle didn't say much during the cab ride but his occasional comments and questions to Alexis did reveal just how devoted and involved a father he was, not that she'd needed more evidence of that. Castle clearly knew all of Alexis's friends and arguably more tellingly, kept tabs on the running little dramas of their lives. Castle really was an amazing dad. She thought about how Castle said he'd lucked out with Alexis and it might be true to an extent—Alexis was obviously a good kid and not inclined to be that rebellious—but she could also see that Castle had done a good job with raising Alexis too. With her job, Kate had seen enough to know some of the negative consequences that divorce and an absentee parent could have on kids but Alexis appeared to have escaped all of them and that was on Castle.

When the cab pulled up outside, Kate opened her mouth intending only to thank Castle for dinner again and wish them both a good night but before she could, Castle told the cabbie to wait and then turned to Alexis, telling her he'd just be a minute.

He was going to walk her to her door. Of course he was.

Leaving Kate to offer Alexis a smile and a good night, which Alexis returned along with a "thanks for helping me out this week at the precinct, Detective."

Kate's smile widened. "It was my pleasure, Alexis. And call me Kate."

"Good night, Kate."

Castle's hand landed on her back as they walked to her building and if she found herself curving ever so slightly into the touch, well, it was just because it was cold outside and his hand was warm.

( _Yeah, right, Kate. Just give it up already._ )

His hand dropped from her back as they entered the elevator of her building and she told herself she didn't miss the warmth of it. They were indoors now after all so she didn't need it for warmth.

"Thanks for joining us for dinner and for the way you've helped Alexis. I know she appreciated it."

Her steps slowed almost imperceptibly, without clear instruction from her brain. "Thanks for inviting me but you don't need to thank me for helping Alexis. She's a pleasure to have around."

"Unlike her father," he quipped.

She laughed softly, nudging him with her elbow. "Eh, I've kind of gotten used to you pulling my pigtails."

He shot her a smile. "Yeah?"

"Yeah."

They had reached her door and she made an inane gesture with her hand. "So… this is me." And then inwardly wanted to kick herself for sounding so stupid. God, was she really so bad at this? And what was this anyway? They were only friends.

"So… um… this was fun tonight."

She had no idea why her breathing was suddenly shallow, her heart tripping in her chest. "Yeah, it was."

"And… I was thinking, maybe we could really make this a tradition, celebrating when we close a case, without Alexis next time," he blurted out, not quite fluently.

No suave playboy now, this was just him, Rick Castle, and he was… asking her out. On an actual date. His fumbling hesitation, the way he wasn't quite meeting her eyes, made that clear. And he was nervous because he… really cared about her answer…

He looked up at her, giving her a hopeful look with his impossibly blue eyes—and that was what did it. When had she become so susceptible to a pair of blue eyes—no, she wasn't susceptible to blue eyes, she was just susceptible to _his_ eyes. (After all, Ryan had blue eyes too and she'd never noticed them beyond the mere fact of their existence.)

Yeah, it was just his eyes that had her reaching up to hold on to the lapel of his jacket and closing the distance between them and brushing her lips against his. His mouth was warm and soft against hers and then his lips parted for the slick of his tongue against hers and her mind went blank because oohhh, yeah, he was a good kisser and she decided fuzzily that kissing him was the best idea she'd had in a long time.

She finally drew back, conscious of a dragging reluctance to do so.

He blinked his eyes open slowly, his eyes dark and warm.

"I… um… so was that a yes?" he asked, his lips—oh god, his lips—just barely curving.

She felt herself flush, biting her lip to try (and fail) to hold back her smile. "What do you think, Castle?"

He slipped his hand around her waist so she was half in an embrace, his eyes lowering to focus on her mouth. "I… think I need more evidence to decide."

She snorted a little. "Since when do you rely on evidence before theorizing?" she teased but the tease was belied by the breathlessness of her voice.

"Since you rendered me incapable of coherent thought."

"Smooth, Castle."

He looked adorably pleased with himself, a smirk curling his lips. "I thought s—"

She cut off his words with her lips, doing what she'd wanted to do for a lot longer than she would ever, ever admit to herself and kissing the smirk off his face. Because now she could, because kissing was apparently something they did now. And when he immediately tugged her closer, kissing her back, she decided that she wanted to feel his mouth working over hers like this every day.

She wasn't sure how long it was before she gently (reluctantly) pushed him away, her hands lingering on his chest. (And sternly resisted the wish to explore the firm planes of his chest further.) "You'd better go, Castle. Alexis is waiting for you."

The mention of Alexis had his eyes clearing as his hand fell from around her waist. "Right right. See you tomorrow?"

It was a question and from the bright, hopeful look he gave her, she knew he was asking about more than just tomorrow but also his earlier question.

She bit her lip but knew a smile escaped anyway. "See you tomorrow."

He abruptly slid his hand behind her neck and gave her a quick kiss that somehow still managed to make her knees feel wobbly, her thoughts blanking. "Good night, Kate."

With that, he turned and was halfway down the hall before she managed to find her voice. "Night, Castle."

He threw her a last, warm look that had her blushing even at that distance and then he was gone, leaving her to finally open the door to her apartment. Kate leaned back against her door, closing it, and felt a silly, giddy smile cross her face, one she was glad no one else was around to see. She had a date with Rick Castle.

 _~The End~_

A/N 2: Thank you all for reading and reviewing!


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